






V * 1 • •* P* 









» %£» AT « 



W • 






: /\ '-aK-* **^ **^* /*\ --W/ *^ 



r oV 



* ^\> '•'SIR' -/"^ *"-^P 



• » ■« 






% ^ -HI*- V** 



^ A* S 












^ "p. 











.* .1^%% 



<> "co- ,V 




V ♦**•- C? 











: ^o v" • 






it ^^ .' 












THE STORY OF THE 

DISCOVERY OF THE NEW WORLD 

BY COLUMBUS. 



THE STORY OF THE 

DISCOVERY OF THE NEW WORLD 

BY COLUMBUS. 



COMPILED FROM ACCEPTED AUTHORITIES 

BY FREDERICK "SAUNDERS, 

LIBRARIAN OF THE ASTOR LIBRARY, 
AUTHOR OF "SALAD FOR THE SOLITARY AND THE SOCIAL," ETC. 




NEW-YORK: 
THOMAS WHITTAKER. 

1892 - /3 4-ft?Jf 



LLJ3 



I 



Copyright, 1892, 
By Thomas Whittaker. 



%§e Carton (press 

171, 173 Macdougal Street, New York 



PREFACE. 



rr^HE design of this volume is to present a 
-*- sketch of the wonderful career of Christo- 
pher Columbus, including his eventful voyage, — 
the most memorable in the annals of maritime 
discovery. 

It has been remarked respecting the renowned 
discoverer, that while his name and fame fill so 
many pages in our historic annals, yet to the 
average reader of the present time the simple 
story of his life is invested with such stirring 
interest that it will continue far beyond the ap- 
proaching occasion that inspires it. 

Associated with the name of Columbus, as this 
Republic will ever continue to be, it will, by its 
wonderful growth and development in civiliza- 
tion and culture, its scientific achievements and 
inventive genius, also impart increasing luster to 



8 PREFACE. 

his renowned achievement. At the approaching 
national celebration of the fourth centennial anni- 
versary of that event — when the several nations 
of the world, by their representatives, assemble for 
the purpose of laying the commemorative wreaths 
of this later age upon the altar of his fame — this 
memorial souvenir of our hero will not, it is 
hoped, prove unacceptable. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

Ante-Columbian Explorers 15 

The Early Life of Columbus 35 

His Adventurous Voyage 53 

His Letter Announcing his Discovery 83 

The Close of his Career 95 

Estimates of his Character 121 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Portrait of Columbus Frontispiece 

v Fac-simile page about Prince Madoc Face 24 



v Columbus at the Convent Gate 

v His Vessels on Their Course 

*j He Starts on his Voyage 

■4 His First Sight of Land , 

J His Landing at San Salvador 

■* Fac-simile page of his First Letter . 
- His Monument at Genoa 



43 
51 
56 
64 

68 

84 

108 



ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 



" The island of Atlantis is mentioned by Plato in his dialogue 
of ' Timaeus.' Solon, the Athenian lawgiver, is supposed to have 
travelled into Egypt. He is in an ancient city on the Delta, the 
fertile island formed by the Nile, and is holding converse with 
certain learned priests on the antiquities of remote ages, when 
one of them gives him a description of the island of Atlantis, 
and of its destruction, which he describes as having taken place 
before the conflagration of the world by Phaeton. This island, 
he was told, had been situated in the Western Ocean, opposite 
to the Straits of Gibraltar. There was an easy passage from it to 
other islands which lay adjacent to a large continent, exceeding 
in size all Europe and Asia." 



ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 



"TTTITH the revival of learning in Europe 
* ▼ came the Reformation, the invention of 
the printing-press and the mariner's compass, 
accompanied with the great announcement by 
Columbus of the Western Continent. No sooner 
was this startling revelation made known to the 
Old World than we find a number of adventurous 
navigators eagerly following in the track of the 
heroic Genoese, — Vespucius, Cabot, Verrazano, 
and many others, representing the principal states 
of Europe. Numerous as they were, however, a 
multitude of nautical adventurers, centuries prior 
to his discovery, were found coasting along the 
Northwestern Ocean. 

As early as the fifth century the Chinese sent 
forth a Buddhist monk, named Hoei-SMn, who, it 
is believed, reached this continent and visited 



16 ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 

what is now called Mexico ; but nothing of im- 
portance seems to be recorded of him. Passing 
over many similar legendary statements of re- 
mote times, we next find the Scandinavian cor- 
sairs cruising along the Northern seas. " Profes- 
sor Raf n, in ' Antiquitates Americana?/ gives no- 
tices of numerous Icelandic voyages to American 
and other lands of the West. The existence of a 
great country southwest of Greenland is referred 
to, not as a matter of speculation merely, but as 
something perfectly well known. Let us remem- 
ber that in vindicating the Northmen we honor 
those who not only give us the first knowledge 
possessed of the American continent, but to 
whom we are indebted besides for much that we 
esteem valuable." * 

The Northmen — who seem to have been the 
terror of the states of Europe, from the North 
Sea to the Mediterranean, and whose long career 
as pirates made them daring and hardy advent- 
urers — were sea-rovers on the Atlantic some five 
or six centuries prior to the Columbian epoch. 
They are said to have had a genius for discov- 
* Dr. B. F. De Costa. 



ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 17 

eries of new lands, and it is believed approached 
the coast of the Western Continent, if, indeed, 
they did not for a time settle within a few hun- 
dred miles of it. In the year 860 they discovered 
Iceland by accident, having been driven npon its 
shores by a storm : and also Greenland by a simi- 
lar casualty, which country they held for more 
than four hundred years, and lost it again for 
more than two centuries. One of their number, 
named Leif, and another, Bjarni, voyaged along 
the coast and discovered what is still called New- 
foundland. It is stated that when they went 
ashore it was found to be snow-covered, barren, 
and without grass. They put to sea again, and 
the next land they found was Nova Scotia, which 
was well wooded, and they called it MarMand 
(woodland). They again set sail with a north- 
east wind, and in two days once more made the 
land ; and it is supposed that they were on the 
coast of New England, and it has been suggested, 
Plymouth County, Massachusetts. It has been 
stated that the first child born of European par- 
ents on this continent, as far as is known, was 
Snorri, the son of Earlesfre, in Vineland, a.d. 1007. 



18 ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 

Thorvaldsen, the Danish sculptor, was among his 
descendants. 

The Scandinavians were accustomed to regard 
as their historians their Skalds, and were fond of 
listening to their poems and the legends of their 
Sagamen. One of the notable Sagas is the Chroni- 
cle of King Olaus, by Snorro Sturleson. One 
Biorne of Iceland, sailing to Greenland in search 
of his father toward the northeast, came in sight 
of a wooded coast, with islands in its vicinity. 

Such records in regard to the settlement of the 
Northmen on the American coast were known to 
have been made, and the fact was frequently 
referred to by early writers. Thus Adam of 
Bremen, who wrote an ecclesiastical history about 
the middle of the eleventh century, has a passage 
relating to the subject which, if it be not a sub- 
sequent interpolation, of which there is no evi- 
dence, is an incontestable proof of the discovery 
of Vineland. He made a visit to Denmark, and 
was informed, he says, by the king, " that a re- 
gion called Vineland had been found by many in 
that ocean, because there vines grew wild. Ac- 
cepting the discovery of America by Northmen 



ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 19 

about a.d. 1000, doubted ouly by those who have 
not had the leisure and opportunity patiently to 
examine the evidence bearing upon the subject, 
and recognizing it as settled, that somewhere 
within a fortnight's sail to the southwest of 
Greenland there must be the Vineland of Leif, so 
long the theme of fireside story, of tradition, of 
record in the Sagas, in the relation of Adam of 
Bremen, and in the Church archives touching 
the departure of Bishop Erik Gnupsson* to Vine- 
land, the question is one, not of the reality of the 
discovery, but of locality." 

To Humboldt its place was between Boston 
and New York. According to Rafn, Leif Erikson 
set up his houses— the earliest Norse dwellings 
in New England — on the shores of Narragan- 
sett bay. The conviction is that he (Leif) did 
not go to the south of Cape Cod, but built his 
houses on the banks of the Charles river, within 
the limits of the present city of Cambridge, not 

*The story of the appointment of Bishop Erik Upsi 
(Gnupsson) to missionary service in Vineland in 1121 is a 
matter of well-known record, preserved in the archives of 
the Vatican. 



20 ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 

far from its entrance into Massachusetts bay at 
Boston. 

The following is a translation from one of the 
Icelandic Sagas of Erik the Red (Erik's Saga 
Mauda) : " Leif went to the court of King Olaf 
Tryggvason ; he was well received by the king, 
who felt that he could see that Leif was a man of 
great accomplishments. Upon one occasion the 
king came to speak with him, and asked him, ' Is 
it thy purpose to sail to Greenland in the sum- 
mer V 'It is my purpose to sail/ said Leif, 'if 
it be your will.' ' I believe it will be well/ an- 
swers the king, l and thither thou shalt go upon 
my errand, to proclaim Christianity there.' Leif 
replied that the king should decide, but gave it 
as his belief that it would be difficult to carry 
this mission to a successful issue in Greenland. 
The king replied that he knew of no man who 
would be better fitted for this undertaking, l and 
in thy hands the cause will surely prosper.' 
i This can only be/ said Leif, ' if I enjoy the grace 
of your protection.' Leif put to sea when his 
ship was ready for the voyage. For a long time 
he was tossed about upon the ocean, and came 



ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 21 

upon lands of which he had previously had no 
knowledge. There were self-sown wheat fields 
and vines growing there." 

This Leif, the Saga further states, " found 
some men upon a wrecked vessel, and he took 
them home with him, and procured quarters for 
them all during the winter. In this wise he 
showed his nobleness and goodness, since he in- 
troduced Christianity into the country, and saved 
the men from the wreck ; and he was called ' Leif 
the Lucky ' ever after." * 

But though several historians of different coun 
tries, who have written within the last two hun- 
dred years, have recognized that this discovery 
was actually made, the details of so interesting a 
fact were not fully known until the different nar- 
ratives were gathered together by the Northern 
Antiquarian Society of Denmark, and published 
in a single volume. 

The fullest and most important of these rela- 
tions exist in manuscript, in a collection known 
as the <l Codex Flatoiensis," written between the 
years 1387 and 1395. These, now preserved in 

* Reeves's "Finding of Wineland." 



22 ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 

the Royal Library at Copenhagen, were found in 
a monastery on the island of Flato, on the west 
coast of Iceland, where they had lain forgotten 
and unnoticed for centuries. There is no serious 
question now of the authenticity of these Sagas, 
as whatever doubt may at one time have been 
entertained has been effectually put to rest. 

Thus much may possibly suffice for details of 
the Scandinavian explorations 5 another and no 
less interesting narrative, which appears to have 
also a historic basis, is that of a Welsh colony, 
with Prince Madoc in command, who were be- 
lieved to have reached this country in the year 
1170. Southey, it will be remembered, made it 
the theme, not of few ballad stanzas merely, but 
of an epic extending to more than one hundred 
octavo pages. The basis of the legend or narra- 
tive seems to depend upon the authenticity of 
certain ancient records found in the abbey of 
Conway, North Wales. The best transcript of 
these documents is said to have been made by 
Gutton Owen, a Welsh bard in the reign of Ed- 
ward IV., in 1480. The bards were the chroni- 
clers or historians of their times, and many of 



ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 23 

them make mention of Madoc and his adventures 
in their odes, and thus the tradition has been 
perpetuated in the Welsh annals. The narrative, 
in brief, is this : On the death of Owen G-wyneth, 
King of North Wales, in the year 1169, his sons 
disputed the succession, and so fierce was the 
family feud, that after many sanguinary encoun- 
ters they separated; some fled, or were driven 
into exile, and among them Madoc left his coun- 
try for some more pacific clime. He is said to 
have embarked for the Western main, with a col- 
ony of his countrymen. The land he reached, 
whatever it was, seems so to have pleased him 
that he left his companions there and returned 
to his native country for a reinforcement of ad- 
venturers, with whom he again set sail westward 
on the Atlantic Ocean; but whether he gained 
his wished-for haven, or was shipwrecked on his 
voyage, has never been known. Conjecture is 
on the side of his having reached land, however, 
because of the evidences of his having mingled 
with Indians. Catlin, who lived some thirty 
years among the Indians, believed that the Man- 
dans were of Welsh origin, because their physical 



24 ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 

appearance was different from that of the other 
tribes, and because the color of their skin, and 
their hair and eyes were peculiar; as well as 
their manner of building their huts, in Druidical 
circles, and their domestic habits, religious rites, 
etc. 

The following page is a reduced fac-simile 
taken from Lhoyd's "Historic of Cambria": 

The full title-page and part of the introduction 
of this quaint old volume, which is believed to be 
the earliest record of the Welsh expedition, is as 
follows: "The Historie of Cambria, now called 
Wales ; a part of the most famous yland of Bry- 
tanie, written in the Brytish language aboue 
two hundreth yeares past ; translated into Eng- 
lish by H. Lhoyd, gentleman; corrected, aug- 
mented, and continued out of Records and best 
approued authors, by Dauid Powel, Doctor in 
Diuinitie." The volume opens with an elaborate 
"Epistle Dedicatorie, to the Right Worshipful 
Sir Philip Sydney Knight." This dedication is 
dated, "From my lodging in London, the 25th 
of March, 1584. Your worships readie at com- 
mandement, Dauid Powel." After which are 



Hettrie,*. Dauid ap O wen. * 

mm tonto, ans bfta t^e language tljcp fetna 

^diisMaibcartlnmguittiatWcncrnccotinene.'biifgftf 
fcbuti be camf,m $e pou* i i 7 o. let mot! of Ino people 
tbctrrano rctumm g bacfec fo: mmt of big otae rtation,ao 
qoamtauceanofrfenDs,, to tnbabite tijatfaire aan large 
countrif jtp enc fattier agatnc Until ten fato 5 as | fiuo no; .. 
tcobpGutyn o wen. J am of opinion ftattfce lano, t^ere- * 
fcnto tic came , teas tome pan of M cik : rbe caufes &$t$ 
make ttte to rtitnttc fo be tyefc 

1 djc common report of tbc inliabt tanto of ftat tmm 
trie , tul^ctjatftraic , djat tyett niters DcfccnferD front a 
fir ange nation, tt>at cauic rtnti>cr ri'oni a farrtcountrte: 
tsd&k^t^ing is confrffcobv Mutczuma king of $attoun< 
tne,tn|>iBo:ationmaocfc2quictu!gof dispeople , niim 
fabmiffton to ftc bingofCaftilc, Hernando Curias being 
tfirn p:cfenr,fccbitb 10 laio oetonc in tfte Spanish £$$!iicie£ 
of ttjf conquctf of $e Wci\ Ind 

2 ffje iB.^ttf^ tooiss ano nautes of p[ace0 ? fcfcMn ftat 
cotHtfrfo mmt® Mb oxie $ rm argue the fame : ao fe&ot 

^eirtoi si Iffim * 3Ifo tfiepftatie a certcmc biro torfl) a 

fbejta^ of Cocrodb , $£ cape of Brycon , t^e rtntr of 
Uwyndor , mtrfbe tadUtte roche of Pcngvvyn,UbidibcaU 
Brynfh 02 WclOi hhh&s,0cp mamfcfHicfljcUj that it uuo 
fbatcountrteti^cbMaviuc aito big people miubitco. 



Fac-simile Page Relating to Prince Madoc. 



ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 27 

eight pages addressed "To the Reader/' which 
commence with these words : " Caradoc of Lan- 
caruan (gentle Reader) collected the successions 
and actes of the Brytish Princes after Cadwala- 
der, to the yeare of Christ 1156. Of the which 
collections there were seneral copies afterwards 
kept in either of the Abbeis of Conwey and Strat- 
flur, which were yearelie augmented as things 
fell out, and conferred together ordinarilie everie 
third yeare, when the Beirdh which did belong to 
those two abbeis went from one to the other in 
the time of their clera, wherein were contained 
besides, snch notable occurrences hapning within 
this lie of Brytaine, as they thought worthie the 
writing, which order of registering and noting 
continued in those abbeis until the year 1270." 

Vancouver found a tribe of Indians in the 
vicinity of the Columbia river whose language 
differed from that of the neighboring tribes, and 
whose features resembled those of northern Eu- 
ropeans. Lewis and Clark, the early travelers 
among the Red men of the Western wilds, also 
refer to some Indians near the mouth of the 
Columbia, whose characteristics corresponded re- 



28 ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 

markably with those described by Vancouver. 
Another authority might be cited, Charlevoix, 
who states that he "found a number of white 
people settled near a lake, by the head-waters of 
the Missouri." 

Sir John Caldwell firmly believed in the fact of 
a Welsh colony having settled among the In- 
dians. He says : " They are the Panis, or, as the 
English pronounce it, Pawnees ; their country lay 
about the head of the river Osage, the southern 
branch of the Mississippi, and extended far west- 
ward to a chain of mountains, from the top of one 
of which the Pacific Ocean could plainly be seen." 
He further states that the Panis or Pawnees were 
whiter than any other tribe of Indians. This 
was the tribe that was represented by a Cherokee 
chief in London, in the year 1792, as of "Welsh 
descent. 

Purchas, speaking- of early discoveries made 
in the northern parts of the New World, Green- 
land, and New France, says : " The first knowl- 
edge that hath come to us of those parts was 
by Nicholas and Antonio Zeno. The former, 
being wealthy and of a haughty spirit, desiring 



ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 29 

to see the fashions of the world, built and fur- 
nished a ship at his own charge; passing the 
Straits of Gibraltar, he held on his course north- 
ward, with intent to see England and Flanders, 
but a violent tempest assailing him, he was car- 
ried he knew not whither." He finally reached 
Friesland, and in 1395 died there. His brother 
Antonio subsequently fitted out an expedition to 
Estotiland. In this country, which is west of 
Friesland, "the people possess some gold, sow 
corn, and make beer ; the wild fowl abound there, 
the land is very extensive, and it was regarded as 
a new world." 

After this voyage Antonio returned to Venice, 
where he died soon after, in 1405. Such are the 
meager data which have come down to us ; yet 
scanty as are the details, some persons have 
based upon them the conclusion that Zeno may 
have reached the American continent. 

Among the immediate precursors of Colum- 
bus, Henry of Portugal was one of the most con- 
spicuous. Prince Henry devoted himself to 
nautical science and explorations ; although the 
son of a king, he relinquished the pleasures of 



30 ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 

the court, and took up his abode on the inhospi- 
table promontory of Sagres, at the extreme south- 
western angle of Europe. It was a small penin- 
sula, the rocky surface of which showed no signs 
of vegetation. It was in this secluded spot, with 
the vast ocean stretching measureless and mys- 
terious before him, that he devoted himself to 
the study of astronomy, built an observatory, 
and, it is said, established a school for the study 
of navigation. He collected the best works of 
the ancient geographers, charts and records of 
explorers ; and with princely liberality of reward 
invited the co-operation of the boldest and most 
skillful navigators. " We look back with aston- 
ishment and admiration at the stupendous 
achievement effected a whole lifetime later by 
the immortal Columbus — an achievement which 
formed the connecting link between the Old 
World and the New ; yet the explorations insti- 
tuted by Prince Henry of Portugal were in truth 
the anvil upon which that link was forged."* 
Another authority t remarks that "the special 
reason which impelled Prince Henry to take the 

* R. H. Major. t Arthur Helps. 



ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 31 

burden of discovery upon himself was, that 
neither mariner nor merchant would be likely to 
adopt an enterprise in which there was no clear 
hope of profit. In 1418 two young captains, 
Johann Goncalvez Zarco and Tristam Vaz, who, it 
is said, were as eager for adventure as the prince 
himself, were ordered on a voyage of discovery. 
They were driven out of their intended course by 
storms, and accidentally discovered a little island, 
where they took refuge, and called it Porto Santo. 
They found there a simple people, not altogether 
barbarous, and their reports on their return de- 
lighted the prince. He immediately sent them 
out again, together with a third ship, commanded 
by Bartholomew Palestrello (whose daughter 
subsequently became the wife of Columbus), 
and with these heroic navigators he sent various 
seeds and animals for the purpose of im- 
proving the island. Meanwhile a dozen years 
roUed on, and Prince Henry had yet won very 
little sympathy in his exploits from his contem- 
poraries." 

Portuguese maritime adventure and explora- 
tion, after the death of Prince Henry, who had 



32 ANTE-COLUMBIAN EXPLORERS. 

devoted his life to the enterprise, did not, how- 
ever, cease. The prince died in 1463. 

After all that has been adduced to show what 
navigators may have discovered in advance of 
Columbus (although their contributions to our 
stock of maritime knowledge must not be under- 
valued, and notwithstanding that his grand dis- 
covery was less the result of design than acci- 
dent), still the noble name of the great admiral 
will ever continue to be associated with that of 
America, and retain the lofty eminence it occu- 
pies in the grateful esteem of mankind. 



THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 



I know not when this hope enthralled me first, 
But from my boyhood up I loved to hear 
The tall pine-forests of the Apennine 
Murmur their hoary legends of the sea ; 
Which hearing, I in vision clear beheld 
The sudden dark of tropic night shut down 
O'er the huge whisper of great watery wastes. 
****** 
I brooded on the wise Athenian's tale 
Of happy Atlantis, and heard Bjorne's keel 
Crunch the gray pebbles of the Vinland shore." 

James Russell Lowell. 



THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 



LESS is sometimes known of our great men 
whose names have become historic than of 
the majority of persons whose claims to our 
regard are of less account. This is the more 
remarkable, since the realm of biographical lit- 
erature never was so widespread as it is at the 
present time. It seems as if our quota of knowl- 
edge of our representative men was to be in 
the inverse ratio of their greatness ; as in the in- 
stances of Homer, Shakespeare, and the hero of 
this brief sketch. Columbus, although not of the 
order of representative bards, was yet a colossus 
among navigators, and endowed with a force of 
character and intrepidity of purpose that defied 
the perils before which others succumbed. He 
achieved his work amidst betrayal and treachery, 
and a long succession of adverse circumstances. 



36 THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 

The historical character of such a man affords 
to the student a fertile theme of thoughtful 
consideration. It is therefore to be regretted 
that, although there have been so many eminent 
writers who have sought to portray his remark- 
able life-story, yet, owing to the fact of the 
paucity of documentary records, we possess but 
varying glimpses of his life, rather than a com- 
plete portraiture of his personality. Not only 
are there blank intervals in his career, but even 
the time and place of his nativity are yet in 
doubt j the best sustained record is, however, 
that Columbus was born at Genoa, about 1436, 
or, according to some writers, 1446. 

The annals of biography may be said, in- 
deed, scarcely to present a parallel instance of a 
character so complex and anomalous — if we are 
to accept all the conflicting statements of his 
various biographers — as that of the renowned dis- 
coverer. Certain it is, that there have been few, 
if any, whose life-record has been so checkered 
and pathetic, yet so illustrious in its results, and 
whose career is invested with such stirring and 
romantic interest as his. His father is said to 



THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 37 

have been a wool-comber, and although living in 
humble circumstances, he seems to have had am- 
bition enough to send his son to the University of 
Pavia to the study of those sciences which might 
qualify him for nautical pursuits. Like other 
boys of that maritime city, he early evinced a 
passion for a sea-faring life. It was at a time 
when learning was leaving the monasteries, to 
take up its abode with the laity. Geographical 
discoveries and adventures had begun to create a 
desire for further geographical knowledge, and 
the writings of Pliny, Strabo, and others, which 
the newly discovered art of printing soon multi- 
plied, were read with avidity. Columbus began 
to make voyages when he was only fourteen 
years of age. As his practical experience in- 
creased his zeal increased, and his enthusiasm 
was enkindled afresh as the wonderful tales of 
mariners concerning mysterious lands seen in the 
far-off Atlantic fell upon his ears. Among the 
stories then current was the tradition of there 
being a large island in the Atlantic called An- 
tilla, mentioned by Aristotle. There was also 
another rumor of an island, on which St. Bran- 



38 THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 

don, a Scottish priest, landed in the sixth cent- 
ury, and founded there magnificent cities; and 
still another concerning seven Spanish bishops, 
with numerous followers, who also settled and 
founded seven cities. There came from Greece 
the story of Atlantis, which Plato is said to 
have learned from the Egyptians — a story which 
gave an account of an immense island in the 
Atlantic Ocean, in ancient times, full of in- 
habitants and great cities, but which had been 
visited by an earthquake and swallowed up by 
the sea. These and other marvelous stories 
and traditions Columbus eagerly listened to, 
and they naturally tended to inspire his glow- 
ing imagination with the bold design of daring 
the perils and dangers of the unknown "Western 
ocean. There is a curious allusion to the dis- 
covery of Columbus in an antique folio printed 
in 1516, which is in the Astor Library, entitled 
the " Polyglott Psalter n of Augustin Justinian, 
Bishop of Nebbio, in the island of Corsica. On 
the margin of Psalm xix., verse 4, he puts a note 
by way of commentary, in which he affirms that 
Columbus frequently boasted that he was the 



THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 39 

person there referred to, and appointed of God 
to fulfill this Biblical statement. 

It is recorded that on a certain occasion a 
mysterious voice said to him in a dream, " God 
will cause thy name to be wonderfully resounded 
through the earth, and will give thee the keys 
of the gates of the ocean, which are closed with 
strong chains." It was doubtless the result of 
overwrought study of his theory ; but to the 
mind of Columbus it might have had the force 
of a supernatural revelation. 

Columbus, it has been said, stood midway be- 
tween the mediaeval and modern ages ; even his 
adventurous voyage over a dark and perilous 
ocean seems symbolic of the fact ; for gloom and 
disaster overshadowed his course until he gained 
the Western shore, when they vanished, and all 
became transfigured with the radiant light. 

Early in the fifteenth century commerce had 
stimulated maritime adventure, and that led to 
maritime discovery. Its most remarkable activ- 
ity was seen in the Mediterranean and Adriatic 
seas ; for the control of this commerce Genoa on 
the Mediterranean and Venice on the Adriatic 



40 THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 

were powerful and zealous rivals. Columbus was 
acquainted with the fact that Marco Polo and 
Mandeville had made extensive Eastern voyages 
and this may have inspired him afresh with his 
great project of exploring the Western seas. 

Columbus made voyages in the service of the 
Portuguese, and in 1477 he visited Iceland and 
parts adjacent ; there he doubtless heard of the 
exploits and discoveries of " Erik the Red," and 
whose achievements must have fired him with 
new zeal. But he was still poor and quite un- 
able to equip an expedition for the purpose, so he 
appealed to the King of Portugal for material 
aid; that monarch was, however, too much en- 
grossed with a war against Spain to listen to his 
overtures. Columbus waited patiently until his 
successor, John II., ascended the throne. This 
young king was appealed to, and his scheme was 
referred to a junta composed of two eminent cos- 
mographers and a bishop ; and they decided that 
his project was extravagant and visionary. Yet 
the king was not satisfied with their decision, and 
he called a council, but the same result followed. 
It was then that the bishop, who was the king's 




Columbus at the Convent Gate. 



THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 43 

confessor, proposed the mean stratagem, that 
he should obtain from Columbus his plans and 
charts, etc., under pretext of considering his en- 
terprise. The evil suggestion was acted upon j a 
three-masted caravel was sent to the Cape de 
Verde Islands, with secret instructions to go as 
far westward as possible, to ascertain if there was 
any truth in the theory of Columbus. They did 
not go far before the cowardly crew became 
frightened by the Atlantic storms, and their base 
enterprise consequently came to naught but dis- 
grace, for Columbus discovered the treachery and 
left Lisbon in disgust, about 1484. 

He next appears at the gate of the Franciscan 
monastery near Palos. According to the testi- 
mony of Garcia Fernandez, the physician of Palos, 
a sea-faring man accompanied by a very young 
boy stopped one day at the gate of the convent of 
La Rabida, and asked of the porter a little bread 
and water for his child. While the porter was giv- 
ing refreshments to the boy, the prior of the con- 
vent passed by, and was at once impressed with 
the dignified bearing of the stranger. He entered 
into conversation with him, and invited him to 



44 THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 

remain as his guest. Columbus revealed his 
name to his benefactor, and told his troubles and 
his purposes. That such a man should be so far 
rejected and his plans disregarded caused the 
good Father Machena much surprise and regret. 
The prior was learned in geographical science, 
and was therefore well able to comprehend the 
grandeur of the views of Columbus. He was 
also deeply impressed with the wisdom of the 
navigator, and sent for a scientific friend at 
Palos to come and converse with his guest j and 
within the quiet cloister of La Rabida the project 
of Columbus was fully discussed. The result of 
their conference was that the prior offered to 
give him a favorable introduction to the Spanish 
court, and to take his son Diego into the convent 
and educate him. Of course Columbus gladly 
accepted the good services of Machena, and yet 
it was found to be an inauspicious time to lay 
the projected enterprise before Ferdinand and 
Isabella, as they were surrounded by the din and 
pageantry of war, to the exclusion of everything 
else. So Columbus, who by this time was no 
stranger to disappointments, returned to become 



THE EABIY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 45 

again the guest at La Rabida until the spring of 
1486, when the court had gone to Cordova. With 
anxious hopes Columbus repaired thither, and 
presented his letter, but instead of securing an 
audience with the king, the prior in attendance 
read the letter, shook his head, and bade the 
poor navigator " good-morning." For a long time 
Columbus lingered in Cordova; but he subse- 
quently found a friend and an advocate of his 
theory in Quintanillo, the controller of the treas- 
ury of Castile. That officer obtained for him the 
aid of Mendoza, archbishop of Toledo and grand 
cardinal of Spain, and by him he was admitted 
to Ferdinand and Isabella. The sovereigns lis- 
tened with deep interest and wonder while he 
presented his projected explorations. The prior 
of Prado was ordered to assemble a council of 
astronomers and cosmographers at Salamanca 
to confer with the navigator. " If the earth is 
round," said the wise men of that council, " you 
will be compelled to sail up a kind of mountain 
from Spain, which you cannot do, even with the 
fairest wind, and you could never get back ! " 
" Columbus appeared in a most unfavorable 



46 THE EARLY LIFE OF QOLUMBUS. 

light before a select assembly — an obscure nav- 
igator, a member of no learned institution, desti- 
tute of all the trappings and circumstances which 
sometimes give oracular authority to dullness, 
and depending on the mere force of natural gen- 
ius. Some of the junta entertained the popular 
notion that he was an adventurer, or at best a 
visionary ; and others had that morbid impatience 
which any innovation upon established doctrine 
is apt to produce in systematic minds. What a 
striking spectacle must the hall of the old con- 
vent have presented at this memorable confer- 
ence ! A simple mariner standing forth in the 
midst of an imposing array of professors, friars, 
and dignitaries of the church, maintaining his 
theory with natural eloquence, and, as it were, 
pleading the cause of the New "World ! " * 

Disappointment and delay seemed to have 
been his fate for a series of years ; for he found 
no one willing to embark in his enterprise. So 
he turned from the monarchs to the rich nobles 
of Spain, but with the same result. The Duke of 
Medina Celi, to whom he applied, advised him 
* Irvine's "Life of Columbus." 



THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 47 

to make another application to the Spanish mon- 
archs, and gave him a letter to the queen. The 
proud spirit of Columbus would not permit him 
again to wait upon the court in the character of 
a suppliant. He now determined to go to Paris, 
and was on his way thither j but meanwhile he 
called again at the convent for his child Diego, 
intending to place him at Cordova. Some in- 
fluential persons had heard of his intention to 
leave Spain, and were deeply regretting his 
departure. One of these was Santangel, crown 
treasurer of the church. He obtained ready 
access to the monarchs, and ably espoused the 
cause and claims of Columbus. The king was 
not convinced; but the queen was, and when 
Ferdinand complained that the war with the 
Moors had exhausted his exchequer, Isabella ex- 
claimed, " I will undertake the enterprise, for my 
own crown of Castile, and if necessary I will 
pledge my jewels for the money." Santangel said 
with emphasis, " It will not be necessary." A 
courier was sent after Columbus ; the queen as- 
sented to his terms, and urged him to prepare to 
start on his great mission as speedily as possible. 



48 THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 

Columbus claimed, as his reward, to be named 
high-admiral and governor-general and viceroy- 
over the lands he discovered, together with one 
tenth of the produce of the countries. Ferdinand 
acquiesced, and the contract was signed by the 
sovereigns, at Santa Fe, on the 17th of April, 
1492. Furnished with authority from the court, 
he caused the royal order to be read, command- 
ing the authorities of the town to have two cara- 
vels ready for sea within ten days, and they with 
their crews placed at the disposal of the Admiral. 
A similar order was issued for the third vessel. 
When this edict was announced, although Palos 
was a seaport, and there were plenty of seamen, 
none seemed inclined to hazard their lives on 
such a perilous expedition, and the greatest con- 
sternation prevailed. Many fled the town to 
avoid being compelled to serve, and for some 
weeks no progress was made toward the equip- 
ment of the vessels. At this crisis, however, 
Martin Alonzo Pinzon, and his brother Vincent 
Yanez, navigators of Palos, of great wealth and 
well-known courage and skill in nautical science, 
came forward, and not only engaged to furnish 



THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 49 

one of the vessels, but to go themselves with 
Columbus. 

Irving thus summarizes this period of his 
career: "It must, however, be remarked that 
many of the facts which filled the interval be- 
tween his departure from Portugal and the time 
when we find him in Spain are mere conjectures. 
What seems incontestable is that during that 
interval he had a hard struggle with poverty — a 
striking proof of which we have in the miserable 
condition in which we first behold him in Spain j 
and it is not one of the least interesting circum- 
stances in his eventful life, that he had in a man- 
ner to beg his way from court to court to offer 
to princes the discovery of a world. The imme- 
diate movements of Columbus on leaving Port- 
ugal are, indeed, involved in uncertainty. It is 
said that about this time he made a proposition 
of his enterprise in person, as he had formerly 
done by letter, to the government of Genoa. The 
Republic, however, was in a languishing con- 
dition and embarrassed by a foreign war. Caffa, 
her great deposit in the Crimea, had fallen into the 
hands of the Turks, and her flag was on the point 



50 THE EARLY LIFE OF COLUMBUS. 

of being driven from the Archipelago. Her spirit 
was broken with her fortunes j for with nations, 
as with individuals, enterprise is the child of pros- 
perity, and is apt to languish in evil days, when 
there is most need of its exertion. Thus Genoa, 
disheartened by her reverses, shut her ears to 
the proposition of Columbus, which might have 
elevated her to tenfold splendor, and perpetuated 
within her grasp the golden wand of commerce. 
The first firm and indisputable trace we have of 
Columbus after leaving Portugal is in the south 
of Spain, in 1485, where we find him seeking 
his fortune among the Spanish nobles, several of 
whom had vast possessions, and exercised almost 
independent sovereignty in their domains." 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 



Chances have laws as fixed as planets have, 
And disappointment's dry and hitter root, 
Envy's harsh berries, and the choking pool 
Of the world's scorn, are the right mother-milk 
To the tough hearts that pioneer their kind, 
And break a pathway to those unknown realms 
That in the earth's broad shadow lie enthralled. 

****** 
Thus ever seems it when my soul can hear 
The voice that errs not : then my triumph gleams, 
O'er the blank ocean beckoning, and all night 
My heart flies on before me as I sail : 
Far on I see my life-long enterprise ! " 

James Russell Lowell. 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 



TN the wide realm of romance, it might be diffi- 
-*- cult to find a narrative so fraught with stir- 
ring and dramatic interest as that of the first 
voyage of Christopher Columbus. That it should 
have often inspired " the poet's lip and the paint- 
er's hand " need not surprise us. 

His earliest voyage was with an expedition 
fitted out in Genoa in 1459, by John of Anjou, 
Duke of Cambria, to make a descent upon Na- 
ples. The republic of Genoa aided him with 
ships and money. After this, the events of his 
early life seem to be unrecorded, and at later 
intervals similar blanks occur in his life-story. 

While at Lisbon, Columbus met with Dona 
Felipa, daughter of Bartolomeo Monis de Pale- 
strello, an Italian who had been one of the most 
distinguished navigators under Prince Henry, 



54 SIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 

and had colonized and governed the island of 
Porto Santo. The acquaintance soon ripened 
into attachment, and ended in marriage. By 
this marriage he acquired the papers, charts, and 
journals of Palestrello, and in this way he be- 
came acquainted with the routes of the Portu- 
guese, and also made voyages to the coast of 
Guinea. When on shore, he supported his fam- 
ily by constructing maps and charts for the gov- 
ernment. His narrow circumstances obliged him 
to observe a strict economy, yet we are told that 
he appropriated a part of his scanty income to 
the support of his aged father at Genoa, and to 
the education of his three younger brothers. 

Columbus believed that he might reach India 
by a western course, and he communicated his 
theory to his friend, the eminent Toscanelli of 
Florence, who wrote to him an encouraging reply, 
and sent him a map projected partly by Ptolemy 
and partly from descriptions of Marco Polo, a 
Venetian, who made an overland journey to 
China in the latter part of the thirteenth century. 
With this map before him, Columbus gathered 
fresh incentives to his purpose. He felt con- 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 55 

vinced that if lie sailed westward lie should reach 
Cathay (now known as China) and the great isl- 
and of Cipangi, which is believed to have been 
Japan. 

Like many important discoveries in science 
and the mechanic arts, the finding of the West- 
ern Continent was the result of accident. Nor 
was Columbus's the only instance of the kind 5 
the Scandinavians, as already stated, and after 
them the Portuguese, afford illustrative exam- 
ples. With the Portuguese, Spanish, and Ital- 
ian, as well as the British, French, and German, 
all seem to have been inspired with the one 
idea of reaching the shortest passage to the opu- 
lent East. Hence, to that seeming accidental 
purpose the world has been indebted for the 
most important achievement of the ages. 

After enduring numerous disappointments and 
adverse fortune, Columbus was at length in a 
fair way to realize his fond desires. He found 
himself in command of three small vessels or 
caravels — the Santa Maria, which was the 
Admiral's (the only one with a deck), and two 
smaller craft, the Pinta and the Nina, with an 



56 SIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 

equipment of sailors numbering one hundred and 
twenty. 

After suitable religious services were held in 
the Church of St. George at Palos, the expedition 
sailed on Friday, the 3d of August, 1492. On 
the 9th the little flotilla reached the Canary Isl- 
ands, where they were detained more than three 
weeks, and early in September they passed to the 
west of the group, and boldly started to the then 
unknown lands beyond* 

* In the appendix to Irving's " Voyages of the Compan- 
ions of Columbus " is an account of the author's visit to 
the seaport town Palos. It is in the form of a letter to a 
friend, and was dated at Seville in 1828. He says: "I 
have made what I may term an American pilgrimage to 
the little port of Palos, in Andalusia, where Columbus fit- 
ted out his ships, and whence he sailed for the discovery 
of the New World. I had long meditated this excursion 
as a kind of filial duty of an American, and my intention 
was quickened when I learnt that many of the edifices 
mentioned in the history of Columbus still remained in 
nearly the same state in which they existed at the time of 
his sojourn at Palos, and that the descendants of the in- 
trepid Pinzons, who aided him with ships and money ; and 
sailed with him in the great voyage of discovery, still 
flourished in the neighborhood. ... I drove up to the 
principal posada, the landlord of which was at the door : 
he was one of the civilest men in the world, and disposed 
to do everything in his power to make me comfortable ; 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 59 

With his charts, which were constructed on the 
basis of that which his friend Toscanelli had pre- 
viously sent to him, Columbus was now fairly 
afloat upon that ocean about which he had heard 
such gorgon tales of terror. With wonderful 
endurance, it is said, the three little vessels con- 
tended with the boisterous waves ; but no vio- 
lent storm had as yet overtaken them. As they 

there was only one difficulty — he had neither bed nor bed- 
room in his house. It was a hard case, but there was no 
help for it. So I commenced the historical researches 
which were the object of my journey, and inquired for the 
abode of Don Juan Fernandez Pinzon — to whom I had re- 
ceived a letter of introduction. My obliging landlord him- 
self volunteered to conduct me thither, and I set off full of 
animation at the thoughts of meeting with the lineal rep- 
resentative of one of the coadjutors of Columbus. ... I 
cannot express to you what were my feelings on treading 
the shore which had once been animated by the bustle of 
departure, and whose sands had been printed by the last 
footstep of Columbus. The solemn and sublime nature of 
the event that had followed, together with the fate and 
fortunes of those concerned in it, filled the mind with 
vague yet melancholy ideas. It was like viewing the 
silent and empty stage of some great draina when all the 
actors had departed. The very aspect of the landscape, 
so tranquilly beautiful, had an effect upon me, and as I 
paced the deserted shore by the side of a descendant of 
one of the discoverers I felt my heart swelling with emo- 
tions and my eyes filling with tears." 



60 SIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 

passed within view of the Peak of Teneriffe, 
which was then in a volcanic blaze, the sailors 
were scared ; and when they had gone over two 
hundred leagues further westward, Columbus 
observed, for the first time, a variation of the 
needle of his compass from a true line with the 
north star. This variation, which already had 
increased five degrees to the northwest, con- 
tinued to increase as they sailed on with no sure 
guide but the stars. 

They now encountered vast masses of sea- weed, 
which much retarded their progress; but soon 
they were cheered by the sight of a land-bird. 
These signs they believed were proofs of adja- 
cent land, and this hope quieted for a season the 
mutinous murmurings of the crew. 

For eleven days after leaving the Canary Isl- 
ands their caravels had sailed before an easterly 
trade-wind, and soon they became calmed from a 
southwest wind. At dim dawn of day, Martin 
Pinzon, standing on the high stern of the Pinta, 
pointing to the southwest, shouted to the Ad- 
miral, in great delight, exclaiming, " Land, land ! 
Senor, I claim the promised reward ! " But, alas ! 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 61 

the apparition soon vanished with the rising sun. 
This was then the first of a similar series of dis- 
appointed hopes they were destined to experience. 
Martin Pinzon advised a more southerly course, 
from seeing a flock of parrots flying toward the 
southwest; but Columbus kept on his western 
way, which caused a fresh mutinous outbreak of 
discontent among the sailors, for they had now 
lost all hope, and in their desperation they openly 
defied the authority of the Admiral. With great 
dignity and calm decision he said to them : " This 
expedition has been sent out by your sovereigns, 
and come what may, I am determined, by the 
help of God, to accomplish the object of the voy- 
age." Enraged as the sailors were, and impatient 
to return to Spain, the proposition of the Admiral 
was complied with — namely, that if, at the ex- 
piration of three days, land was not discovered, 
he would abandon the enterprise and return 
home. Columbus felt confident that land could 
not be very far off, from indications so many and 
promising as to be almost deemed infallible. 

" We will cast you into the sea, and return to 
Spain," cried one of the most determined of the 



62 SIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 

crew j and it is added, that just at sunset, as they 
were about to carry their threat into execution, 
a coast fish was seen to glide by, a branch of 
thorn with berries on it floated by, and a piece 
of carved cane came to tell them the welcome tid- 
ings that they were nearing land. These favorable 
indications around them, and the calm, determined 
will of their commander, had the effect of subdu- 
ing somewhat the insurrection, and the voyagers 
continued their course with sullen discontent. 

Irving, however, quoting from Las Gasas and 
also from Navarrete, says, that "these authori- 
ties do not mention the incident given by some 
historians, namely, that Columbus, a day or two 
previous to coming in sight of the New World, 
capitulated with his mutinous crew, promising if 
he did not discover land within three days that 
he would abandon the voyage. The statement 
rests merely upon the report of Oviedo ." 

The following graphic sketch of the great 
crisis of Columbus's voyage is from an interest- 
ing recent work* As it is based upon his Diary, 
it is all the more interesting and valuable. 
* "With the Admiral." 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 63 

" At ten o'clock his quick sight caught a glim- 
mer of light out to sea, which almost instantly 
disappeared. Fixing his eye on the quarter 
where it had vanished, he called to Pedro Gutier- 
rez and Rodrigo Sanchez, who were near by, and 
asked whether they could not see it as well ; then, 
raising his voice, he hailed the look-out on the 
bows, ' Old, in the prow there, see you not a light 
yonder off the port-bow 1 ' As the ship rose on a 
billow, Pedro Gutierrez saw the light plainly, and 
so told the captain, but Rodrigo Sanchez could 
not catch sight of it from where he stood. Up 
from the bows too came an answering hail which 
left the matter still in doubt : l No, Senor Captain, 
we see no light from here.' Once or twice more, 
however, the wavering spark showed itself to Co- 
lumbus's intent gaze, and then sank out of sight. 
" Sweeping swiftly to the west— for half a gale 
was blowing— the fleet held on its way, the Pinta 
leading, with the Nina next, and the flagship last 
of all. Hour after hour went by without inci- 
dent of any kind. At midnight the watch was 
changed, and fresh look-outs took the place of 
those who had been straining their eyes so far in 



64 HTS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 

vain ; but still the troubled surface of the ocean 
was all that met the sight. On board the Santa 
Maria the silence was unbroken, except by the 
swash of the waves against the ship's hull, and 
the low voices of the sailors as now and then they 
muttered some remark to one another. Just as 
the watch was again changing, toward two 
o'clock, the clouds which had been hiding the 
moon blew off, and the whole sea for leagues 
around was bathed in a flood of clear white light. 
Scarcely had the last shadows swept over the 
rolling sea when a brilliant flash of fire was seen 
in the direction of the Pinta, and the dull roar of 
a cannon was borne down the wind to the vessels 
astern. It was the signal for land in sight, and 
the flagship pressed forward to join her foremost 
consort. As her impatient sailors neared the 
Pinta they had no need to ask the news; for 
directly before them, not more than a couple of 
miles away, lay the low and rounded summits of 
what were clearly sand-hills, while on the beach 
below a heavy surf was dashing in lines of snowy 
foam. At the very moment the moon emerged 
from the clouds, Juan Rodriguez Bermejo, one of 




First Sight of Land. 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. QJ 

the Pinta's seamen from a little village near Se- 
ville, had seen the first beams fall on the glitter- 
ing sand and frothy breakers, and had hurriedly 
fired a gun, with excited cries of, t The land ! the 
land ! ' Had the moon remained hidden but a 
few minutes longer, there would have been a ship- 
wreck to report." 

This was on the memorable 12th of October, 
1492. Columbus was now, in spite of the appall- 
ing and seemingly insuperable difiiculties which 
environed him, enabled to accomplish his grand 
design and verify his theory. 

" The great mystery of the ocean was revealed j 
his theory, which had been the scoff of sages, was 
triumphantly established ; and Columbus had 
thus secured to himself a glory as enduring as 
the world itself." 

" When first Columbus dared the western main, 
Spanned the broad gulf, and gave a world to Spain, 
How thrilled his soul with tumult of delight, 
When through the silence of the sleepless night 
Bursts shouts of triumph ! " 

Much discussion has recently been devoted to 
the question as to which of the Bahama group of 



68 SIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 

islands Columbus first sighted and landed upon. 
The drift of the prevailing belief is that it was 
what is known as Watling's Island, since that 
more closely than any other corresponds to the 
required characteristics of the original authorities. 
The Indian name of the island first discovered 
was Chianahani; the Admiral on landing gave it 
the Spanish name — San Salvador (Holy Saviour). 
He visited other islands adjacent, and settled 
a small colony at Cuba, or San Domingo, and 
discovered, among other things, that the natives 
of Fernandina lived in dwellings shaped like 
tents, and had nets stretched between posts, which 
they called hamacs, a name at once adopted by 
the ship's crew for swinging beds. Columbus 
called all these island groups West Indies, think- 
ing they were near India, and he gave the name 
Indians to all native tribes, accordingly, which 
they have continued to be called ever since. 
After discovering several others of the West India 
Islands, he set sail for Spain, where he arrived 
March 15, 1493. Columbus, even after he had 
in a subsequent voyage sighted the coast of South 
America, still held on to the fallacy that he had 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 71 

reached the western part of the East Indies; 
and he died under the delusion. 

It is a curious coincidence of events and days, 
to mention that Columbus started on his great 
expedition on a Friday; he first discovered the 
Western shores on a Friday ; he commenced his 
return voyage to Spain on a Friday; and on a 
Friday reached the port of Palos. Yet it is the 
proverbial saying of sailors that it is an unlucky 
day. 

On his return voyage a fearful tempest over- 
took the frail flotilla ; so perilous was their condi- 
tion, indeed, that religious services were performed, 
and by the order of Columbus a number of beans, 
equal to the number of persons on board, were 
put into a cap, on one of which was cut the sign 
of the cross. Each of the crew made a vow that, 
should he draw forth the marked bean, he would 
make a pilgrimage to the shrine of Santa Maria 
de Guadalupe, bearing a wax taper of five pounds' 
weight. The Admiral was the first to put in his 
hand, and the lot went to him. From that mo- 
ment he considered himself a pilgrim, and bound 
to perform the vow. In spite of this, the tempest 



72 SIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 

still raged, and the vessel was rolled and tossed 
about at the mercy of the waves, and each man 
gave himself up for lost. Columbus, fearing that 
his discoveries would be buried with himself and 
crew, wrote on parchment a brief account of his 
voyage and achievements. This he sealed and 
directed to the king and queen, superscribing a 
promise of a thousand ducats to the finder of the 
package, if it should be delivered unopened. He 
then wrapped it in a waxed cloth, which he placed 
in the center of a cake of wax, and inclosing the 
whole in a large barrel threw it into the sea, giv- 
ing his men to understand that he was perform- 
ing some religious vow. Lest this memorial 
should never reach the land, he inclosed a copy 
in a similar manner and placed it upon the poop 
of his vessel, so that, should it be swallowed up 
by the waves, the barrel might float off and sur- 
vive. But at last the storm ceased, and on the 
morning of the 15th of February land was seen ; 
but the Pinta had disappeared. 

Three men now hailed the vessel. They said 
that the Portuguese governor knew about Colum- 
bus and his plans. Columbus reminded his men 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 73 

that they had vowed, during the tempest, to make 
a religious procession. Accordingly, one half of 
the crew landed, and walked in procession, bare- 
footed and in their shirts, to the chapel, while the 
Admiral awaited their return to perform the same 
ceremony with the remainder. Scarcely had they 
begun with their devotions, when they were sur- 
rounded by the rabble of the village and all taken 
prisoners. 

The form of the land prevented Columbus from 
seeing from his ship what was taking place on 
the island, and he was filled with anxiety because 
his men did not return. After awhile a boat put 
off from the island, where it appeared that the 
Portuguese government, out of jealousy, had or- 
dered the seizure of the crews of Columbus, and, 
if possible, himself also. After considerable par- 
ley, and the exhibition of his letters patent, sealed 
with the royal seal of Castile, he obtained the 
release of his men, and immediately set sail, but 
was driven by a furious storm into the Portuguese 
port Rastello. The weather prevented his pro- 
ceeding on his voyage, and the Portuguese came 
on board to welcome him, and the king, who was 



74 HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 

at Valparaiso, sent a message for him to come 
to court. Columbus was not without suspicion 
that the Portuguese intended him some evil, but 
he went to the court and related his adventures. 

Some of the king's counselors pretended to be- 
lieve that he had made no new discoveries, but 
had only visited some of the places which had 
been before discovered by the Portuguese, and 
they advised the king to detain him. But this 
he feared to do, and Columbus returned to his 
ship and resumed his voyage, and on the 15th day 
of March, at midday, entered the harbor of Palos, 
whence he had sailed on the 3d of August in the 
preceding year. 

It is a singular coincidence that on the evening 
of the day Columbus arrived at Palos, and while 
the demonstrations of joy were still going on, the 
Pinta, with Martin Alonzo Pinzon, also arrived. 
After his separation from the Admiral in the 
storm, he had made the port of Bayonne, and 
thinking that Columbus had been swallowed up 
by the tempest, wrote the sovereigns, claiming the 
honor of all discoveries, and requesting permis- 
sion to come to court and relate his adventures. 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 75 

He thought to enter Palos first, but when, on 
entering the harbor, he beheld the vessel of Colum- 
bus and heard the enthusiasm with which he had 
been received, his heart died within him, and he 
returned to his home deeply dejected. The reply 
to his letter to the sovereigns soon arrived; it 
was of reproachful tenor, and forbade his appear- 
ance at court. This letter completed his humilia- 
tion; the anguish of his feelings increased his 
bodily malady, and in a few days he died, a vic- 
tim to deep chagrin. 

The sovereigns ordered Columbus to come im- 
mediately to court, where he was received with 
the greatest pomp and ceremonies. A splendid 
procession was formed, in which were displayed 
all the wonders of the New World, specimens of 
all the birds, plants, gold, gems, and, last of all, 
the men of a new race. 

At their request Columbus related all his hard- 
ships and adventures, and of the apparently in- 
exhaustible treasures of the New World, which 
would add incalculable wealth to the dominion of 
their majesties. 

During the whole of his sojourn at Barcelona, 



76 SIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 

the sovereigns took every occasion to bestow on 
Columbus personal marks of their consideration. 
He was admitted at all times to the royal pres- 
ence, and the queen delighted to converse with 
him on the subject of his enterprises. 

" The bells sent forth a joyous peal in honor of 
his arrival j but the Admiral was too desirous of 
presenting himself before the sovereigns to pro- 
tract his stay long at Palos. His progress through 
Seville was an ovation. It was the middle of 
April before Columbus reached Barcelona. The 
nobility and cavaliers in attendance on the court, 
together with the authorities of the city, came to 
the gates to receive him, and escorted him to the 
royal presence. Ferdinand and Isabella were 
seated, with their son Prince John, under a 
superb canopy of state, awaiting his arrival. On 
his approach they rose from their seats, and ex- 
tending their hands to him to salute, caused him 
to be seated before them. These were unprece- 
dented marks of condescension to a person of 
Columbus's rank in the haughty and ceremonious 
court of Castile. It was, indeed, the proudest 
moment in the life of Columbus. He had fully 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 77 

established the truth of his long-contested theory 
in the face of argument, sophistry, sneer, skepti- 
cism, and contempt. After a brief interval the 
sovereigns requested from Columbus a recital of 
his adventures 5 and when he had done so, the king 
and queen, together with all present, prostrated 
themselves on their knees in grateful thanks- 
givings, while the solemn strains of the Te Beum 
were poured forth by the choir of the royal chapel 
as in commemoration of some glorious victory." * 
In the midst of their rejoicings the Spanish 
sovereigns lost no time in taking every measure 
necessary to secure their new acquisitions, and 
were very desirous that Columbus should fit out 
another expedition. Accordingly, money, men, 
and credit were put at his disposal, and officers 
of high rank were chosen to assist in fitting out 
the vessels, all to be under the command of Co- 
lumbus. Seventeen vessels were prepared for the 
voyage — three large ones and fourteen smaller 
ones ; and instead of the difficulties which he be- 
fore had found in getting men enough to furnish 
his crews, great numbers, some of high rank, 
* Preseott. 



78 BIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 

pressed forward to get permission to make the 
voyage. The number had been limited to one 
thousand, but the desire to go was so great that 
the number was increased to twelve hundred. 
Many more were refused for want of room in the 
ships for their accommodation, but some contrived 
to get admitted by stealth, so that eventually about 
fifteen hundred set sail in the fleet. As Columbus 
had provided everything that seemed requisite 
for the equipment of the expedition — and the ex- 
penses had exceeded the amount anticipated — the 
comptroller, Juan de Soria, refused to sign the 
accounts of the Admiral, and in consequence in- 
curred the rebuke of Columbus. For this insub- 
ordination he is said to have been reprimanded, 
also, by the sovereigns, who commanded him to 
treat the Admiral with the respect due to his 
authority. From similar injunctions inserted in 
the royal letters to Fonseca, the archdeacon of 
Seville, it is believed that " he had occasionally 
indulged in the captious exercise of his official 
powers. These trivial differences are worthy of 
notice from the effect they appear to have had 
on the mind of Fonseca, for from them we must 



HIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 79 

date the rise of that singular hostility which he 
ever afterward manifested toward Columbus 5 
which every year increased in rancor, and which 
he gratified in the most invidious manner, by 
secretly multiplying impediments and vexations 
in his path." * 

This brief outline sketch of the celebrated voy- 
age of the Admiral may be fittingly closed with 
the graceful sonnets of Sir Aubrey de Vere : 

" The crimson sun was sinking down to rest, 

Pavilioned on the cloudy verge of heaven ; 
And Ocean, on her gently heaving breast, 

Caught and flashed back the varying tints of even ; 

When, on a fragment from the tall cliff riven, 
With folded arms, and doubtful thoughts opprest, 

Columbus sat, till sudden hope was given, — 
A ray of gladness shooting from the West ! 
O what a glorious vision for mankind 
Then dawned upon the twilight of his mind — 

Thoughts shadowy still, but indistinctly grand ! 
There stood his genie, face to face, and signed 

(So legends tell) far seaward with her hand : 

Till a new world sprang up, and bloomed beneath her 
wand! 

"He was a man whom danger could not -daunt, 
Nor sophistry perplex, nor pain subdue ; 
A stoic, reckless of the world's vain taunt, 
And steeled the path of honor to pursue : 
So, when by all deserted, still he knew 

* Irving. 



gO BIS ADVENTUROUS VOYAGE. 

How best to soothe the heart-sick, or confront 
Sedition ; schooled with equal eye to view 

The frowns of grief and the base pangs of want. 

But when he saw that promised land arise 

In all its rare and beautiful varieties 
Lovelier than fondest Fancy ever trod, 

Then softening nature melted in his eyes ; 
He knew his fame was full, and blessed his God, 
And fell upon his face and kissed the virgin sod ! " 



HIS LETTER ANNOUNCING HIS 
DISCOVERY. 



" To his intellectual vision it was given to read the signs of the 
times in the conjectures and reveries of the past ages, the indi- 
cations of an unknown world : as soothsayers were said to read 
predictions in the stars, and to foretell events from the visions of 
the night."— Washington Irving. 

" He in the palace-aisles of untrod woods 
Doth walk a king : for him the pent-up cell 
Widens beyond the circles of the stars, 
And all the sceptered spirits of the past 
Come thronging in to greet him as their peer ; 
While, like an heir new-crowned, his heart o'erleaps 
The blazing steps of his ancestral throne." 

James Russell Lowell. 



HIS LETTER ANNOUNCING- HIS DISCOVERY. 



"TTT"HEN Columbus set sail on his memorable 
* * voyage, lie commenced a journal, intended 
for the inspection of the Spanish sovereigns. It 
opened with a stately prologue, in which he refers 
to the motives and aims which led to his expedi- 
tion. He proposed to keep this record, as he said, 
after the manner of Caesar's Commentaries. It 
will not be expedient to make further reference 
to this fact, however, the restricted limits of this 
work not admitting of citations from his journal. 
It must suffice to present a fac-simile page of the 
celebrated document known as his " First Letter," 
announcing his great discovery, together with 
some extracts from it in a translation from the 
Latin. On his return to Spain from his first voy- 
age Columbus, while on board of his ship, wrote 
two letters in Spanish. One was addressed to 



84 HIS FIRST LETTER 

Luis de Santangel, the Crown Treasurer of Spain. 
One of these letters is believed to have been lost, 
but the other reached its destination, when it was 
translated into the then current court language, 
the Latin. Its publication created a profound 
sensation throughout the states of Europe, six 
editions of the Latin text having been exhausted 
within the year of its first appearance, besides the 
Spanish and other translations into the French, 
German, and Dutch. This " First Letter" of Co- 
lumbus is perhaps the rarest literary relic of our 
Americana j as a proof of it, it may be mentioned 
that two years ago a copy was sold at auction in 
New York at a little within three thousand dol- 
lars. It has been stated that only three copies 
were known to be in existence, the one ref erred 
to, and two in the British museum Library. It 
is proper to correct this statement, as a choice 
copy has been on exhibition during some score 
of years, among the illuminated manuscripts and 
incunabula in the show-cases of the Astor Library. 
This copy was the gift of the Hon. William Wal- 
dorf Astor. 

This little relic consists of only four small leaves 



fr&fiffob (ftufftofa! €okmtmi me ncftra mulry dTc&eti cfc 
JnfitUg Jndk fup.'a CBangon Rupcrinuert0*2tdqua0 prrgrat* 
d.-w cK-t-iuo antoa rnrnic aufpftf hi i err foisfctifTcmoffcrnfdi f 

1>;Iilafxt bi^panfa? Hegu mifftte fufraf: ad magfufjcumdnm 

milfequS nofetlie a«r [itteratue rir Ireander dc Cofce abfcifpa 
no fejotnaf* m \.\mum wumit ratio kale 93at>iX}*cccc<]cchf 
^onrifkatw Bictandrj Sari Snno puma* 

Qtfcmtam fufceplt p:otifittfe rem perfccmm me?fimm:m 
fuifTf granmi ribs fee fciojfJas a-nfhtm tyarara que re 
rniufanuf^ ra mboc noffro irinere geftc IntiCnttqp n& 
fmncmv.lCnanmortvao dfe|X>fNj)€^fbil8difccfti in mare 
Jndica pcrwcnUvbi phnmm infulw frniumetig baottacae bo* 
mimbu-arepper^qyarum omnium pjofelicifcoUegc noftro 
pieconio celebrar o ? ret i I lis c i renfi c on rradtc ente rtemi ne pofi 
fefTionem acctpi'pn'roeqjfariimdsm SaluatoMonomm lmpo# 
ftu ■ aiip 8 fttn 1 8 a h ti h tarn ad banc, cp ad cet c r .•> all ,n s - paw 
nimuiv€ai!t^o3ndf0nanaf?anmrcH ant Suartietiammatfl 
qnanq^rwao nomine nnncupiiuijquippf alii infulam Banae 
IBaHekfoncepnonavaHam j-erna?idmam> aham l)plabdl.im< 
allam Tmmm*% tk dcnhqim ap^dlm mitVifum pnmnm 111 
earn mfuiamquam dudum "joanam rocari cfiri appniimutf: iu> 
jta aw lirttitKxcidcntem rerfuu aliquantulum p.'oaifrt amep 
earn magnam nullo reperto fine inuatf :rt non tnfuhr. fed conri 
fimton Cbatai piotiinriatn eflfe tredidtnnu nulla tit rtdens op 
^idamuniripjauelnmarifimjsfifaconftnib^pifreraliqiicer^ 
€0% ? picdia rortica:curti quo? tnrolte loqui nequibam-qnard? 
nwl ac noe ridebant furripiebanr fugam « picgrediebar v\tm 
erifftmarw ahqua me prbcm riliafue mumturu»£)auc£ ridcm? 
qp longt' admodum pzogrt flit) nihil noui cmergdwrn bmot ria 
noe ad Septenrnoncm drferebat:^ fpfefugercfropfabaTrerrie 
tttnim regnabat b*ttma:ad Buftruro^ erat m roto corenderc; 



Fac-simile of the "First Letter" of Columbus. 



ANNOUNCING HIS DISCOVERY. 87 

or eight pages, printed in Latin from Gothic type, 
upon time-worn paper, which, but for its subject- 
matter, would have been long ago discarded, but 
which on that very account is now so highly prized 
that it may be said to rival in interest much of 
the multitudinous issues of the press. The fol- 
lowing is the translation from the Latin of the 
commencement of the " Letter' 7 : 

" Letter from Christopher Colom : — to whom 
our age oweth much — concerning the islands of 
India, beyond the Ganges, recently discovered. 
In the search of which he was sent, under the 
auspices and at the expense of the most invinci- 
ble sovereigns of Spain, Ferdinand and Isabella, 
— addressed to the noble Lord Gabriel Sanchez, 
Treasurer of the same most serene monarchs, 
which the noble and learned man Leander de 
Cosco translated from the Spanish idiom into 
Latin the 3d day of the calends of May, 1493 : 
the year one of the Pontificate of Alexander VI." 

It may suffice to add here the closing passage 
of the document, as indicative of the enthusiasm 
and exultant joy that inspired the heart of the 
discoverer. He adds : 



88 SIS FIRST IETTER 

" Let then the king and queen, the princes and 
their happy kingdoms, unite with Christendom in 
returning thanks to our Saviour Jesus Christ for 
granting us such victorious success. Let them 
make processions, celebrate solemn festivals, and 
ornament the temples with palms and flowers; 
and let us also rejoice, not only at the exaltation 
of our faith, but also at the increase of temporal 
goods, of which Spain and Christendom will 
gather the fruits." 

In the spring of 1891, at the sale of a private 
library in this city, a copy of the "Letter" in 
Spanish by Columbus, announcing to Ferdinand 
and Isabella his discovery of the " famous land," 
was sold for $4300. As the small quarto consists 
of but four leaves or eight pages, containing only 
about 2500 words, it is in proportion to its size 
the most expensive book in the world. The sum 
mentioned is about the price of a perfect copy of 
the first folio edition of Shakespeare. The orig- 
inal Spanish edition of this "Letter" was ad- 
dressed to Luis de Santangel in the spring of 
1493, only three copies of which are now known 
to be in existence. Until recently, the only copy 



ANNOUNCING HIS DISCOVERT. 89 

of this original edition supposed to exist was that 
in the Ambrosian Library at Milan. 

This copy formed part of the collection of the 
Baron Pietro Custodi, which was bequeathed to 
the Ambrosian Library in the year 1852, but had 
been mistaken for a Spanish edition of the other 
letter which was written by Columbus at the 
same time to Gabriel Sanchez. Annexed is an 
extract from the translation of this Spanish let- 
ter. It is the first description of the New World 
ever written : 

" To the first island that I found I gave the 
name of San Salvador, in remembrance of His 
High Majesty, who hath marvelously brought all 
these things to pass j the Indians call it Guana- 
hani. To the second island I gave the name of 
Santa-Maria de Conception, the third I called Fer- 
nandina, the fourth Isabella, the fifth Juana ; and 
so to each one I gave a new name. When I reached 
Juana, I followed its course to the westward, and 
found it so large that I thought it must be 
the mainland — the province of Cathay ; and as I 
found neither towns nor villages on the sea-coast, 
but only a few hamlets, with the inhabitants of 



90 HIS FIEST LETTER 

which I could not hold conversation, because 
they all immediately fled, I kept on the same 
route, thinking that I could not fail to light upon 
some large cities and towns. At length, after 
the proceeding of many leagues, and finding that 
nothing new presented itself, and that the coast 
was leading me northward (which I wished to 
avoid, because winter had already set in), I re- 
solved not to wait for a change in the weather, 
but returned to a certain harbor which I had 
remarked, and from which I sent two men ashore 
to ascertain whether there was any king or large 
cities in that part. They journeyed for three 
days and found countless small hamlets with 
numberless inhabitants, but with nothing like 
order; they therefore returned. In the mean- 
time I had learned from some other Indians 
whom I had seized, that this land was certainly 
an island ; accordingly, I followed the coast east- 
ward for a distance of one hundred and seven 
leagues, where it ended in a cape. 

" All these islands are very beautiful, and dis- 
tinguished by a diversity of scenery; they are 
filled with a great variety of trees of immense 



ANNOUNCING HIS DISCOVERY. 91 

height, and which I believe to retain their foliage 
in all seasons ; for when I saw them they were as 
verdant and luxuriant as they usually are in Spain 
in the month of May— some of them were blos- 
soming, some bearing fruit, and all nourishing in 
the greatest perfection, according to their respect- 
ive stages of growth and the nature and quality 
of each ; yet the islands are not so thickly wooded 
as to be impassable. The nightingale and various 
birds were singing in countless numbers, and that 
in November, the month in which I arrived there. 
There are besides in the same island of Juana 
[Cuba] seven or eight kinds of palm trees, which, 
like all the other trees, herbs, and fruits, consider- 
ably surpass ours in height and beauty. The 
pines also are very handsome ; and there are very 
extensive fields and meadows, a variety of birds, 
different kinds of honey, and many sorts of 
metals, but no iron. 

" In another island, which I named Hispaniola 
[Hayti], there are mountains of very great size 
and beauty, vast plains, groves, and very fruitful 
fields, admirably adapted for tillage, pasture, and 
habitation. The convenience and excellence of 



92 BIS FIRST LETTER. 

the harbors in this island, and the abundance of 
the rivers, so indispensable to the health of man, 
surpass anything that would be believed by one 
who had not seen it. The trees, herbage, and 
fruits of Espanola are very different from those 
of Juana ; ^and, moreover, it abounds in various 
kinds of spices, gold, and other metals. The in- 
habitants of both sexes in this island, and in all 
the others which I have seen or of which I have 
received information, go always naked as they 
were born, with the exception of some of the 
women, who use the covering of a leaf or small 
bough, or an apron of cotton which they prepare 
for that purpose." 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 



" Our human hearts are harps divinely strung, 
And framed diversely : waiting for the power 
Of kindred soul, and on each chord is hung 

A wondrous tower 
Of song and glory ! which, if touched aright, 
Would fill the world with light ! " 

T. Fowell. 

"Oh! who can tell what days, what nights he spent, 
Of tideless, waveless, sailless, shoreless woe ! 
And who can tell how many glorious once, 
To him, of brilliant promise full,— wasted, 
And pined, and vanished from the earth ! " 

PoUok. 



"There are three kinds of praise,— that which we yield, that 
which we lend, and that which we pay. We yield it to the pow- 
erful from fear, we lend it to the weak from interest, and we pay 
it to the deserving from gratitude." 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 



THE departure of Columbus upon his second 
voyage was in striking contrast to the 
gloomy forebodings of his enforced crew when 
sailing from the port of Palos. On the 25th of 
September, 1493, the anchors were weighed and 
the vessels departed, amid the joys, good wishes, 
and strong hopes of the whole nation. They left 
the bay of Cadiz, and on the evening of the 27th 
of November cast anchor in the harbor of La 
Navidad. It was too late to distinguish objects, 
and, impatient to satisfy his doubts, Columbus 
ordered two cannon to be fired. The report 
echoed along the shore, but there was no reply 
from the fort ; every eye was directed to catch 
the gleam of some signal light, every ear listened 
to hear some friendly shout ; but no light was to 
be seen and no voice heard. On landing in the 



96 THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 

morning they found the fort entirely destroyed, 
and hardly a trace of the settlement left. 

Columbus could not for some time get any ex- 
planation of the cause of these disasters, but as 
far as he could learn from the natives, the Span- 
iards had behaved in a very reckless and licen- 
tious manner, and as soon as he had gone spent 
their time in laziness and vicious indulgences, had 
neglected all necessary precautions for their 
safety, and in the dead of night were surprised by 
Coanabo and his warriors, and massacred. Gua- 
cauagari, the friendly cacique, and his subjects 
fought valiantly in their defense, but were routed, 
the cacique himself wounded, and his village 
burned to the ground. 

Columbus felt no desire to begin a settlement 
on a spot which had proved so unfortunate, so, 
sailing away, he found another harbor about forty 
miles distant, where he founded the first Christian 
city of the New World, and gave to it the name 
of Isabella, in honor of the queen. 

This second voyage of Columbus extended 
from September, 1493, until June, 1496 ; and it 
might have served to prove to the enthusiastic 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 97 

navigator " how different is the reality of a course 
of ambition from the romance, which imagination 
so vividly portrays." More islands were explored j 
the mainland of America being still not even 
imagined by Columbus or any of his followers. 
But the extravagant expectations of enormous 
wealth which Columbus had himself cherished, 
and which had filled his vessels with greedy hidal- 
gos, who thought of little else than yellow gold, 
were of course grievously disappointed. Cuba, 
Hispaniola, Jamaica, and Guadaloup were not to 
any great extent gold-producing countries. Pro- 
visions for so large a body of adventurers soon 
ran short, and Columbus was obliged to compel 
his indolent followers to labor for the production 
of food. Great indignation was soon evinced 
by these gentry; insurrections and conspiracies 
broke out against the Admiral, and they contrived 
to send their bitter complaints to the Spanish 
court. In 1495, Juan Anguado, in manifest con- 
travention of the agreement which the sovereigns 
had signed, was sent out to investigate these 
charges against Columbus. From the very com- 
mencement he had been granted the governorship 



98 THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 

of the lands which he discovered, and yet by this 
act that grant was thus unscrupulously rescinded. 
Columbus, finding the affairs of the colony in such 
an unsatisfactory condition, and that such false 
charges had been sent to the Spanish sovereigns 
criminating him, he availed himself of one of the 
ships that was just about leaving for Spain, that 
he might vindicate himself in person. After a 
long and tedious voyage, he reached Cadiz on the 
11th of June, 1496. The landing of Columbus 
at this time was very different from what it was 
when he returned before: then everybody was 
pleased and astonished, and he was received with 
the greatest joy j now the men who returned with 
him were sick, tired, and discouraged, and told 
all sorts of stories about the colony and about 
Columbus. He, instead of dressing himself in 
scarlet and gold, as he did before, felt so humbled 
at the troubles he had experienced that he clothed 
himself as a monk, with a cord around his waist. 
He was very kindly received by the sovereigns, 
and they did not speak of the stories they had 
heard against him. He described in the most 
favorable manner the further discoveries he had 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 99 

made, and asked for eight ships, in order to carry 
out supplies and to make further discoveries. At 
last, after great delays, a certain sum was appro- 
priated to the use of Columbus, and on the 30th 
of May, 1498, he sailed with six ships on his third 
voyage. When he reached Cape Ferro he divided 
his squadron, sending three vessels with supplies 
to Hispaniola, and taking with him the other three 
to sail in a more southerly direction. Columbus 
soon found himself in a very warm latitude ; the 
air was dreadfully hot ; tar melted, and the pro- 
visions were spoiled from the great heat, so he re- 
solved to steer westward. As he continued his voy- 
age, he discovered on the 1st of August land lying 
to the south. He supposed it was another island, 
but it was, however, in fact a part of the conti- 
nent ; but it was the fate of Columbus never 
to know how great was the extent of his dis- 
coveries. 

Meanwhile, affairs upon the island which he 
had left more than two years before were fast get- 
ting from bad to worse. Continual disturbances 
with the natives, internal troubles and jealousies 
among themselves, were bringing about the great- 



100 THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 

est confusion. Every disappointment, no matter 
by whom caused, was blamed to Columbus, and a 
great enemy arose in the person of one Roldan, 
who did everything in his power to make the peo- 
ple dissatisfied with the rule of Columbus. This 
was the state of affairs the Admiral found upon 
his return. He thought it best, after doing his 
utmost in the way of conciliation, to hasten the 
sailing of ships to Spain, and by them sent letters 
to the sovereigns explaining affairs and acquitting 
himself. But a great many complaints against 
Columbus had been carried to Spain. The fol- 
lowers of Roldan represented him as very cruel 
and unjust, and pretended that he meant to take 
the island for himself, and did not care for the 
sovereigns. The complaints became so numerous 
that, notwithstanding the efforts of the friends 
of Columbus, who endeavored to show how con- 
stant were his efforts to keep these unruly men 
in order, the sovereigns concluded to send out 
a commissioner to inquire into the state of the 
island. For this purpose they appointed a man 
named Bobadilla, and invested him with great 
powers — with instructions to deprive Columbus 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 101 

of his office should he find him guilty, and take 
it himself. 

The arrival of Bobadilla caused great excite- 
ment. Columbus was absent, so Bobadilla estab- 
lished himself in his house and seized all his gold, 
jewels, books, papers, and writings, and spoke in 
the most disrespectful manner of Columbus, and 
upon his return to San Domingo seized him, put 
him in chains, and confined him in the fortress. 
All the dissatisfied people on the island now 
flocked to San Domingo, and tried to gain the 
favor of the new ruler by finding fault with all 
Columbus had done. Bobadilla listened to all 
these complaints, and when he had collected what 
he thought was proof enough of the guilt of 
Columbus, a guard was sent to remove him from 
the fortress to the ship. 

The vessel set sail early in October, bearing 
Columbus, shackled like the meanest culprit, and 
followed by the insults and curses of the rabble. 
The worthy Villejo and the master of the caravel, 
Andreas Martin, would have taken off his irons, 
but to this he would not consent. 

"No," said he, proudly, "their majesties com- 



102 THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 

manded me by letter to submit to whatever 
Bobadilla should order in their name; by their 
authority he has put me in these chains. I 
will wear them until they shall order them to 
be taken off, and I will preserve them afterward 
as relics and memorials of the reward of my 
services." 

When it was known in Spain that Columbus 
was brought home in a shameful and disgraceful 
manner, loaded with chains, the people were 
much grieved, and so much did everybody in 
Spain take the part of Columbus that the sover- 
eigns, without waiting for the papers sent by 
Bobadilla, sent orders to Cadiz that he should at 
once be set at liberty and treated with respect, 
and wrote him that they were very sorry for 
what he had suffered, and desired him to come to 
court. 

Columbus was much comforted when he found 
himself restored to favor. He had borne all his 
trials meekly, but when he found himself so 
kindly received, and saw that the queen had tears 
in her eyes, he could no longer command his feel- 
ings, but fell down at her feet, so moved that 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 103 

tears and sobbing took from the brave old Ad- 
miral the power to speak. 

The sovereigns spoke kindly to him, and raised 
him up ; told him that Bobadilla had acted con- 
trary to their orders, and that he should be dis- 
missed, and assured Columbus that his sufferings 
should be redressed and his property restored. 

The king promised to take away the govern- 
ment of the island from Bobadilla, and to send 
out some other person, who should take care of 
the colony for two years, at the end of which 
time Columbus should be restored to all his 
power over it. 

The person chosen was named Ovando, who 
was to be placed at San Domingo, with power to 
rule over all the islands and mainland, and also 
to examine into the accounts of Columbus and to 
restore to him the property unjustly taken away 
by Bobadilla. 

The fleet appointed to convey Ovando to his 
government was the largest that had yet sailed 
to the New World. It consisted of thirty-four 
vessels, nine of which were from ninety to one 
hundred and fifty tons burden, twenty-four cara- 



104 THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 

vels from thirty to ninety, and one bark of twenty- 
five tons. The number of persons carried was 
about twenty-five hundred, many of them persons 
of rank and distinction, with their families. 

The squadron put to sea on the 13th of Febru- 
ary, 1502. In the early part of the voyage it was 
encountered by a terrible storm : one of the ships 
foundered, with one hundred and twenty souls ; 
the others were obliged to throw overboard every- 
thing on deck, and were completely scattered. 
The shores of Spain were strewed with articles 
from the fleet, and a rumor spread that all the 
ships had perished. When this reached the sover- 
eigns they were so overcome with grief that they 
shut themselves up for eight days, and admitted 
no one to their presence. The rumor proved in- 
correct; but one ship was lost, the others reas- 
sembled, and arrived at San Domingo on the 15th 
of April. 

Columbus sailed on his fourth and last voyage 
on the 9th of May, 1502. He was sixty-six years 
old, and his constitution was much impaired by 
the hardships and sufferings which he had under- 
gone. His frame, once powerful and command- 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 105 

ing, was now wrecked by infirmities, and subject 
to paroxysms of severest pain. 

The voyage was disastrous, and the health 
of the Admiral suffered from his exposure and 
persecution, as well as from the approaching 
infirmities of age ; but the worst was the muti- 
nous conduct of his crew, which compelled him 
to return to Spain in November, 1504, having 
added nothing of importance to his previous dis- 
coveries. 

Thus it will be apparent that Columbus had 
found certain of the West India islands, and parts 
of Central and South America, but had not even 
sighted the coast of North America. 

There seem to have been two supremely happy 
moments in the strange life of this strange man 
— the first when he saw land after his advent- 
urous voyage j the second, the recognition of his 
achievement. Between these two, however, all 
the happiness of his life was condensed. 

This is his sad description of himself in one of 
his letters to Ferdinand and Isabella : 

" Such is my fate that twenty years of service, 
through which I passed with so much toil and 



106 THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 

danger, have profited me nothing ; and at this 
day I do not possess a roof in Spain that I can 
call my own. If I wish to eat or sleep, I have 
nowhere to go bnt to the inn or tavern, and I sel- 
dom have wherewith to pay the bill. I have not 
a hair npon me that is not gray j my body is in- 
firm j and all that was left me, as well as to my 
brothers, has been taken away and sold, even to 
the frock that I wore, to my great dishonor. I 
implore your highnesses to forgive my complaints. 
I am, indeed, in as ruined a condition as I have 
related. Hitherto I have wept over others ; may 
Heaven now have mercy upon me, and may the 
earth weep for me ! " 

" Joy, joy for Spain ! a seaman's hand confers 
These glorious gifts, for a new world is hers ! 
But where is he? that light whose radiance glows, — 
The loadstone of succeeding mariners ! 
Behold him, crushed beneath o'ermastering woes, — 
Hopeless, heart-broken, chained, abandoned to his 
foes !" 

Columbus died in 1506, at Valladolid, in neg- 
lect. So little did men think of the event that 
an official announcement of his death was not 
made until twenty-seven days after ; and so com- 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 107 

plete had become the indifference of even Span- 
iards that one Spanish historian, writing in regard 
to his early voyages, had not heard of his death 
in 1507, and another was ignorant of it in 1508. 

Nobody seemed interested about the death of 
Columbus j at the end of seven years, however, 
Ferdinand, not wishing to leave to history the 
record of his ingratitude and neglect of the dis- 
coverer who had so enlarged the grandeur of 
Spain, ordered that obsequies for the deceased 
should be celebrated conformably to his rank of 
High Admiral. His coffin was exhumed from the 
convent of San Francisco, and transported to the 
cathedral of Seville, where, at the expense of the 
king, a solemn requiem was performed, after 
which the body was deposited in the vaults of 
the convent of Las Cuevas, at Seville. 

There has been no little controversy as to the 
final resting-place of the remains of the discov- 
erer; but the question seems at length to have 
been satisfactorily settled that they are enshrined 
in the cathedral of San Domingo. The monu- 
ment is a plain white marble bas-relief, about 
f our feet high, representing in a medallion a very 



108 THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 

apocryphal portrait of the Admiral, the inscrip- 
tion being : 

" O restos e Ymajen del grande Colom ! 
Mil siglos durad guardados en la Urna, 
Y en la remembranza de nuestra Nacion." 

(Oh, remains and image of the great Columbus ! 
For a thousand ages rest secured in this urn, 
And in remembrance of our nation. ) 

There are many monuments erected to the 
memory of Columbus in several parts of Europe j 
that once known as Ferdinand's no longer exists. 
There is one in the plaza of San Domingo, and 
another of great elegance at Genoa, erected about 
thirty years since. Another is in Cuba, and there 
is one facing the Capitol at Washington. 

For an ideal portrait of Columbus it is stated 
that he was tall, of good presence, well formed, 
muscular, and of an elevated and clignined de- 
meanor. His visage was long, and; neither full 
nor meager; his complexion fair%nd freckled, 
and inclined to ruddy ; his nose aquiline ; his 
cheek-bones rather high; his eyes light gray; 
his whole countenance had an air of authority. 
His hair in his youthful days was of a light col- 




Monument of Columbus at Genoa. 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. HI 

or, but care and trouble soon turned it gray, and 
at thirty years of age it was quite white. 

It is stated that there are about one hundred 
different portraits of Columbus extant, but none 
that is known to have been painted from life. 
The most reliable is believed to be that painted 
by Julio Giovio, who, although a contemporary, 
did not make his portrait from life, but some fif- 
teen years after the death of the Admiral. The 
picturesque frontispiece to this volume is from 
the ideal portrait of a celebrated French artist, 
Leopold Flameng. 

It seems strange that, although it must have 
been known at the time that Columbus was the 
first to discover America, it was not named after 
him, since it is admitted that Americus Vespucius 
did not reach the shores of the continent for more 
than a year subsequently. Vespucius reached 
South America in the year 1497, while Columbus 
was preparing for his third voyage. He pub- 
lished a glowing description of the new lands he 
had visited. Columbus died in 1506 and Vespu- 
cius in 1512 ; and in the year which followed the 
death of the former, the attempt was first pub- 



112 THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 

licly made to ascribe to Vespucius the priority 
of the discovery of the Western Continent, and 
to impose npon it the name America. 

It seems to be the opinion of some historians 
that Americns Vespncius arrogated to himself 
the privilege of conferring his own name npon 
the country that he knew Colnmbns had dis- 
covered, for he was personally acquainted with 
him. Nothing can invalidate the glories of the 
real discoverer, however 5 for although it bears 
the name of America, the New World will ever 
be associated with that of Colnmbns. The earli- 
est publication of the Vespucius narrative was 
in 1504, while the name and letters of Colum- 
bus were familiar throughout Europe from 1493. 
Humboldt says: "It was not Vespucius, but 
an obscure man, who invented the name of 
America, and who proposed it in his work — l Cos- 
mographies, Introdiictio insuper quatuor Amend 
Vespucii Navigations .'" But from whatever 
source, and with whatever design, originated the 
appellation of America, contemporary historians 
did not so entitle the new continent, nor is the 
name inscribed upon any chart or map prepared 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. H3 

within twenty-eight years after the first great 
voyage across the Atlantic. 

It was called by historical and many of the 
early geographical writers, "The New World," 
"The Indies/' "Western India/' etc., while the 
research of Robertson shows Gomara, Oviedo, 
Herrera, Martyr, and Benzoni (the two last coun- 
trymen of Vespucius) ascribing the discovery to 
Columbus. Whether the honor of conferring the 
name on the newly discovered continent was alien- 
ated from its rightful owner by fraud, through 
any confederacy of the enemies of Columbus, 
with or without the knowledge of Vespucius, is 
a question that seems to puzzle historians, and 
therefore is not now easy to determine. We find, 
indeed, another class of writers who, in advo- 
cating the character of Vespucius, insist that he 
has been covered with a great deal of unmerited 
obloquy. 

Before 1507, when Jean Basin of Saint-Die pub- 
lished the name America, it is said not to be 
found in any printed document, nor even in any 
manuscript of recognized and incontestable au- 
thority. 



114 THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 

M. Marcou, of the Geographical Society of 
Paris, claims that his theory of a native origin 
for the name of America has been accepted in 
Spain, Spanish America, and, with some excep- 
tions, in the United States ; in France, Germany, 
and Italy it has excited donbt and surprise, but 
in the last named he has the support of the emi- 
nent Turin geographer, M. Guido Cora. " There 
is no doubt that Columbus and Vespucci went 
along the Mosquito coast at the foot of the Sierra 
Amerrique, and that the name was reported by 
the officers and men of these expeditions, and 
Schoner, the geographer, declared in 1515 that the 
name was already popular in Europe." 

It should be remembered that both Vespucius 
and Columbus died believing they had discovered 
Cathay or the western shores of the Indies, never 
dreaming that what we call America was a sepa- 
rate continent. This supposed land had then a 
name — the Indies, which it retains officially still 
in Spain. True it is that the first maps, especially 
those emanating from Rome, mentioned the New 
World as Terra Sancta Cruris (the Land of the 
Holy Cross) ; and as late as the seventeenth cen- 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER, H5 

tury maps were still published with no other 
designation ; but when they first began to exhibit 
the name of America, Vespucius had ceased to 
exist. 

Yespucius first sighted this continent, partly by 
accident, in 1498. It was his first voyage as a 
subordinate officer, under command of an expedi- 
tion which was guided by the charts which Colum- 
bus had drawn of the course to Trinidad and the 
coast of Pavia nearly a year before. 

Four voyages are ascribed to Vespucius: the 
first voyage undertaken for the King of Spain; 
then in the capacity of pilot or of simple trader 
in 1497 ; or, according to Las Casas, Herrera, and 
others, the second voyage was also undertaken for 
the King of Spain, probably under Vicente Pin- 
zon. The third voyage was undertaken for the 
King of Portugal ; the expedition sailed probably 
under Cabral from Lisbon, May 10, 1501. The 
fourth voyage was also undertaken for the King 
of Portugal, and that expedition sailed from Lis- 
bon in 1503. The description of these four voy- 
ages was published for the first time together in 
a kind of appendix to a Latin work on cosmog- 



116 THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 

raphy by Waldsee Miiller, in 1507. Vespucius, 
from whom America may be said to have acci- 
dentally received its name, was born at Florence 
in 1451. He was engaged in mercantile pursuits 
in Seville when Columbus, in 1496, was making 
preparations for a second voyage to the New 
World. The success of the great discoverer in- 
flamed Vespucius with a passion for discovery. 
He sailed from Cadiz on the 29th of May, 1499, in 
the expedition commanded by Admiral Hojeda, 
and after a voyage of thirty-seven days arrived 
at that portion of the continent of America now 
called Cumana, and explored some hundreds of 
miles along the coast. He returned in the autumn 
of the same year, but soon commenced a second 
voyage, under Admiral Pinzon, which resulted in 
the discovery of a cluster of small islands on the 
south of the Gulf of Mexico. The maps published 
detailing his explorations brought him great rep- 
utation. 

The relics and memorabilia of Columbus are 
still preserved with scrupulous care in the Impe- 
rial Library at Seville. There may be seen the 
identical charts, drawings, and calculations which 



THE CLOSE OF HIS CAREER. 117 

Columbus had made and used in his first voyages 
over the Western ocean. There also is the manu- 
script volume, inscribed by his own pen, which 
Washington Irving discovered many years since, 
while making researches among the archives of 
Spain, for his work on " Columbus." In addition 
there yet exist there the steel armor and breast- 
plate, inlaid with gold, as well as the sword of 
the great Admiral ; and his letters addressed to 
Queen Isabella, bound in volumes — all which pos- 
sess imperishable interest to the ages. 

A leading authority * on the subject has esti- 
mated that about six hundred authors have al- 
ready written upon Columbus exclusively, and that 
the literature referring incidentally to the subject 
is of vastly greater extent. In addition to this a 
new race of writers at the present time is busily 
making fresh researches into the history of the 
great event which, for a season, is the absorbing 
topic of out' time. 

On the 18th of February, 1890, the American 
Congress arranged for celebrating the four hun- 
dredth anniversary of the discovery of America 
* Harrisse. 



118 THE CLOSE OF HIS CABEEE. 

by an exhibition to be held in Chicago in May, 
1893. This act provided the sum of $1,500,000 for 
the erection of special buildings for the Govern- 
ment exhibit, admitted goods for exhibition duty 
free, and empowered the various governmental 
departments to contribute toward its success. 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 



"'Tis -with our judgments as our watches,— none 
Go just alike,— yet each believes his own." 

Pope. 

"The parts of a judge are to select and collate the material 

points of that which hath been said, and to give the rule or 

sentence." 

Bacon. 

" Let none direct thee what to do or say; 
Till thee thy judgment of the matter sway ; 
Let not the pleasing many thee delight ; 
First judge, if those whom thou dost please, judge right." 

Sir J. Denlmm. 



" Most heartily I do beseech the court to give the judgment.' 

Shakespeare. 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 



GREAT writers have immortalized, poets 
idealized, and priests would canonize Colum- 
bus ; but the question as to his real character yet 
to some seems still in doubt. It is a difficulty 
that has increased in proportion to its age ; and 
in the vindication of truth, it has been said that 
the work is very great, but the laborers in the 
cause are very few. " There is a certain meddle- 
some spirit," wrote Irving, "which in the garb of 
learned research goes prying about the traces of 
history, casting down its monuments, and mar- 
ring and mutilating its fairest trophies. Care 
should be taken to vindicate great names from 
such pernicious erudition : it defeats one of the 
most salutary purposes of history— that of fur- 
nishing examples of what human genius and laud- 
able enterprise may accomplish." 



122 ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 

Looking through the hazy distance of four cen- 
turies, it is difficult to form any adequate estimate 
of a character so complex as that of Columbus. 
In some respects it seems unique, and not to be 
judged by any modern standard of criticism. 
That he was brave, persistent, and heroic, as 
well as inspired with a lofty ambition, is evident. 
That he accomplished a wonderful discovery, al- 
though unwittingly, and that he has consequently 
become the central figure in nautical adventure 
and discovery is equally true. But although in- 
stinctively brave and self-denying, he seems yet 
to have been recklessly ambitious, intolerant, and 
even cruel to his own ship's crew, and still more 
tyrannical to the natives of the lands he had vis- 
ited ; yet he became himself, in his last days, the 
victim of treachery and shameful persecution, 
ending his great career in disgrace and poverty. 

Writes Mr. Harvey : " I am no hero- worshiper, 
nor do I wish to be the iconoclast my friends have 
sometimes called me. In a progressive age there 
cannot be many men distinguished above their 
fellows ; there must be groups of men of talent ; 
it is only in an unenlightened time that individual 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 123 

men can stand out conspicuously. ... So 
thinking, a Curtius leaps into the gulf, a Regulus 
returns to torture and to death, a Leonidas keeps 
the pass. It is right to record their acts for guid- 
ance or avoidance, but not by undue adulation to 
dissociate them from their surroundings. Nor 
must we do this with Columbus." 

Justin Winsor comes to this conclusion with 
regard to the character of Columbus : "We have 
seen a pitiable man meet a pitiable death. Hardly 
a name in profane history is more august than 
his. Hardly another character in the world's 
record has made so little of its opportunities. 
His discovery was a blunder ; his blunder was a 
new world; the New World is his monument! 
Its discoverer might have been its father; he 
proved to be its despoiler. He might have given 
its young days such a benignity as the world likes 
to associate with a maker ; he left it a legacy of 
devastation and crime. He might have been an 
unselfish promoter of geographical science; he 
proved a rabid seeker for gold and a viceroyalty. 
He might have won converts to the fold of Christ 
by the kindness of his spirit ; he gained the exe- 



124 ESTIMATES OF HIS CM ABAC TEE. 

crations of the good angels. He might, like Las 
Casas, have rebuked the nendishness of his con- 
temporaries ; he set them an example of perverted 
unbelief . The triumph of Barcelona led down to 
the ignominy of Valladolid, with every step in the 
degradation palpable and resultant." 

Another authority* remarks: "As a mariner 
and discoverer Columbus had no superior j as a 
colonist and governor he proved himself a failure. 
Had he been less pretentious and grasping, his 
latter days would have been more peaceful. Dis- 
covery was his infatuation ; but he lacked practi- 
cal judgment, and he brought upon himself a se- 
ries of calamities." 

" There is perhaps no other instance on record 
of a great man whom disappointments and injus- 
tice did not dishearten and disgust, who had his 
greatness recognized in his lifetime and yet was 
robbed of his emoluments, and who, after death, 
had the honor he had so hardly won conferred 
upon another ! " Our latest authority t states 
that " the chains in which he had been brought 
back as a prisoner from the New World, and 
* Hubert Bancroft. t Tarducci's " Columbus." 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 125 

which he had always kept hung up in his room 
as a memorial of the reward bestowed for his 
services, he directed to be placed in his sepul- 
cher after death j and his will was in this respect 
punctually executed. No one seemed aware of 
his passing away. The death of the discoverer of 
the New World passed without notice within the 
walls of the city where he died. But the oblivion 
with which the malice of his enemies succeeded 
in surrounding his person was soon dispelled by 
the brilliant splendor of his fame, to which time 
gave ever-increasing strength and vigor. King 
Ferdinand himself was forced to yield to the 
growing influence of his fame, and ordered a 
monument erected to the man he had caused to 
expire in poverty and anguish in a lodging- 
house ! n 

11 In most biographies a very erroneous concep- 
tion of the subject would be received from a man's 
own account of himself and his deeds. But in 
the case of Columbus there is no such danger. 
No man ever presented so faithful a mirror to re- 
flect all his thoughts and dreams, hopes and dis- 
appointments, greatness of soul with petty weak- 



126 ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 

nesses, as Columbus, The fault to be fouud with 
previous histories of Columbus is either that au 
attempt is made to picture Columbus as a model 
of perfection, or there is a want of accuracy in 
details. Many documents have been brought to 
light within the last half century which, with the 
aid of intelligent criticism, have greatly increased 
our knowledge of Columbus. He is, as Alexander 
von Humboldt calls him, ' a giant standing on the 
confines between mediaeval and modern times; 
and his existence marks one of the great epochs in 
the history of the world.' " * 

" Columbus was a man of quick sensibility, 
liable to great excitement, to sudden and strong 
impressions, and powerful impulses. He was 
naturally irritable and impetuous, and keenly sen- 
sible to injury and injustice ; yet the quickness 
of his temper was counteracted by the benevo- 
lence and generosity of his heart. The magna- 
nimity of his nature shone forth through all the 
troubles of his stormy career. He has been ex- 
tolled for his skill in controlling others ; but far 
greater praise is due to him for his firmness in 
* H. F. Brownson. 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 127 

governing himself. In his letters and journals, 
instead of detailing circumstances with the tech- 
nical precision of a mere navigator, he notices the 
beauties of nature with the enthusiasm of a poet 
or a painter. It is but justice to his character to 
state that the enslavement of the Indians taken 
in battle was at first openly countenanced by the 
crown, and that when the question of right came 
to be discussed at the entreaty of the queen, sev- 
eral of the most distinguished jurists advocated 
the practice ; so that where the most learned men 
have doubted, it is not surprising that an un- 
learned mariner should err. These remarks in 
palliation of the conduct of Columbus are required 
by candor." * 

Columbus, like all distinguished characters of 
history, might be said, in an eminent degree, to 
represent the spirit and prevailing thought of his 
times. Nautical enterprise and adventure were 
the characteristics of his epoch, and he seems to 
have appeared on the stage of action just at the 
time that was most propitious for the develop- 
ment of his enterprise. Numerous writers have 
* Irving. 



128 ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 

sought to portray the wonderful career of Colum- 
bus. These may be named : the most conspicu- 
ous are Las Casas, Major, Irving, Rosselly de 
Lorgues, Harrisse, and Tarducci. For the most 
part, each present us with a different phase or es- 
timate of his character. It seems, from the last- 
named authority, that for any one who may desire 
to follow all the steps of Columbus in his check- 
ered life, Washington Irving and Rosselly de 
Lorgues are perhaps the two that dispute the 
field in this respect. 

The words of an acknowledged critic on the 
subject, Mr. Harrisse, may fittingly be here intro- 
duced. He says : "I do not mean to underrate 
the important services rendered by Christopher 
Columbus, or to condemn him for the errors 
which he committed in his surmises and argu- 
ments. No, indeed ! All innovators, everywhere 
and always, have experienced and advocated delu- 
sions. Even now, in this age of scientific truths, 
we see discoveries spring out of mistaken notions, 
not only in the sphere of hypothesis, but in exact 
sciences. Take, for instance, the detection of the 
planet Neptune, which in many respects is not 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER, 129 

unlike the discovery of America. In 1846, after 
years and years of the most arduous mathematical 
calculations, Le Verrier announced that the irregu- 
larities in the motion of Uranus were due to the 
disturbing action of some unknown planet, and 
that by pointing the telescope on the first of Janu- 
ary, 1847, toward a certain part of the heavens, 
the celestial body, long suspected but never seen, 
would appear. And sure enough, near or about 
the degree of longitude marked by Le Verrier, on 
the day appointed, Neptune was duly detected. 
Yet when astronomers became possessed of the 
necessary data, and studied the problem, they 
found that the very elements of Le Verifier's com- 
putations were wrong. It is a question, therefore, 
whether there were not as many errors and as 
much luck in Le Verrier's memorable discovery 
as in that of Columbus. Nor must you believe 
that I am inclined to lessen the real merits of the 
great Genoese, or fail to admire him ; but my ad- 
miration is the result of reflection, and not a blind 
hero-worship. Columbus removed out of the 
range of mere speculation the idea that beyond 
the Atlantic Ocean lands existed, and could be 



130 ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 

reached by sea, and made of the notion a fixed 
fact, and linked forever the two worlds. That 
event, which is unquestionably the greatest of 
modern times, secures to Columbus a place in the 
pantheon dedicated to the worthies whose cour- 
ageous deeds mankind will always admire. . . . 
When a great event occurs, in science as in his- 
tory, the hero who seems to have caused it is only 
the embodiment and resulting force of the medi- 
tations, trials, and endeavors of numberless gen- 
erations of fellow-workers, conscious and uncon- 
scious, known and unknown." 

" It is not too much to say that Columbus owes 
his grand success to his unselfish unity of purpose. 
There was no want of breadth in his character to 
canker the fair fame of his benefaction to the 
world. Even the most glorious work of men's 
hands would fail to be a fit memorial of him 
whose monument is half the inhabited world. 
We find no fault in him ! When smaller men 
tried to rise upon the ruin of his credit, he took it 
quietly, and forgave it without scorn. There is 
not one imperfection to limit our reverence for 
his memory. The son of a humble Genoese wool- 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 131 

comber, he left his children a distinction prouder 
than a pedigree of the purest blood." * 

An able writer t in the North American Review 
thus summarizes the unjust treatment which 
Columbus was destined to suffer from the hands 
of Ferdinand: " Columbus entered the Spanish 
service in 1486, and continued in it for twenty 
years, until his decease in 1506. Of this period 
six years were employed in solicitations to be sent 
to the Indies ; twelve succeeding were occupied in 
his voyages of discovery ; and for the residue, he 
was a humble suppliant in Spain, awaiting justice 
to redress or death to terminate his sufferings. 
His treatment during this whole period was such 
as to give his biographers occasion to declare that 
Spain did no more than yield a tardy assistance 
to the great undertaking, and afterward to per- 
secute him who had replenished her provinces 
with wealth. And what are the proofs alleged in 
regard to the years preceding his voyage? He 
was permitted to gain a scanty subsistence by 
selling charts in the seaports of Andalusia; he 
was uniformly befriended by Don Diego de Deza, 
* J. C. H. t Caleb dishing. 



132 ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 

afterward archbishop of Seville 5 he was protected 
two years by the Duke of Medinaceli ; more than 
this, he was actually preserved from starvation 
by Juan Perez, prior of La Rabida, and the alms 
of his religious house. But where, in the mean- 
time, was the bounty of his kind-hearted and lib- 
eral king ? Did Ferdinand ever lend a candid ear 
to the representations of Columbus, or hospitably 
entertain him in the extremity of his want ? No ! 
Navarrete has ransacked every record in Spain, 
from the royal repositories of Simancas and the 
Escurial, to the more humble collections of his 
literary friends j and no vestige remains of the 
patronage of the government at this period but 
a simple passport granted him in 1489. He, a 
necessitous Genoese pilot, advanced doctrines in 
geography adverse to all the received opinions of 
his contemporaries. Neither the quality of the 
individual nor the nature of his object was calcu- 
lated to produce a favorable impression upon the 
Spaniards. In his zeal to vindicate Ferdinand, 
Navarrete seems to have lost sight of the truly 
monstrous injuries which Columbus was doomed 
to suffer. He ostentatiously recounts the honors 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHAEACTEB. 133 

bestowed upon the navigator on his return from 
his first voyage ; but omits to contrast these with 
the indignities by which they were again and 
again outweighed. Columbus returned from his 
second voyage in 1496, and was compelled by the 
intrigues of Don Juan de Fonseca to wait in at- 
tendance two whole years before he could obtain 
another armament. During the Admiral's resi- 
dence in Hispaniola, upon this third expedition, 
the colony became overflowed with the scum of 
Spain — men of desperate character and turbulent 
spirits, who threw the whole island into confusion 
by their licentiousness. Columbus saw that the 
very existence of the colony was at stake, and 
with admirable firmness and courage he quelled 
the dissolute crew which surrounded him, and 
rescued the settlement from ruin. Order they 
denounced as tyranny, and their false accusations 
against Columbus obtained a ready credence from 
Ferdinand, who dispatched Bobadilla to the Indies 
to supersede Columbus. The very second day 
after his landing, without even giving Columbus 
preparation for the outrage, he ordered him and 
his two brothers to be seized and transported to 



134 ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 

Spain in irons I This Bobadilla then took posses- 
sion of all the Admiral's papers, his money, and 
his honse, appropriating them thus fraudulently 
to his own use." 

These various tributes to the memory of Co- 
lumbus would be incomplete without the follow- 
ing rugged, energetic words of Carlyle. He says : 
" Brave sea-captain, Norse sea-king — Columbus, 
my hero, royalest sea-king of all! It is no 
friendly environment this of thine, in the waste 
deep waters ; around thee mutinous, discouraged 
souls, behind thee disgrace and ruin, before thee 
the impenetrated veil of night. Brother, these 
wild water-mountains bounding from their deep 
bases are not entirely there on thy behalf ! Thou 
art not among articulate-speaking friends, my 
brother 5 thou art among immeasurable dumb 
monsters, tumbling, howling, wide as the world 
here. Secret, far off, invisible — invisible to all 
hearts but thine — there lies a help in them : see 
how thou wilt get at that. Mutiny of men thou 
wilt sternly repress ; weakness, despondency, thou 
wilt cheerily encourage ; thou wilt swallow down 
contempt, complaint, weakness of thyself and 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 135 

others; — how much wilt thou swallow down! 
Yes, niy world-soldier, thou of the world-marine 
service, thou wilt have to be greater than this 
tumultuous, unmeasured world here round thee 
is: thou in thy strong soul, as with wrestler's 
arms, shalt embrace it, harness it down, and 
make it bear thee on, — to new Americas." 

The following glowing estimate of the character 
of our hero is from the pen of one * who has de- 
voted some years to the study of the historic and 
representative men of all ages ; and whose ana- 
lytical skill in the delineation of character has 
been long recognized : 

" Wrapped up in those glorious visions which 
come only to a man of superlative genius, and 
which make him insensible to heat and cold and 
scanty fare, even to reproach and scorn, this in- 
trepid soul, inspired by a great and original idea, 
wandered from city to city, and country to coun- 
try, and court to court, to present the certain 
greatness and wealth of any state that would em- 
bark in his enterprise. But all were alike cynical, 
cold, unbelieving, and even insulting. He op- 
* Dr. J. Lord. 



136 ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 

poses overwhelming, universal, and overpowering 
ideas. To have surmounted these amid such pro- 
tracted opposition and discouragement constitutes 
his greatness; and finally to prove his position 
by absolute experiment and hazardous enterprise 
makes him one of the greatest of human benefac- 
tors, whose fame will last through all the genera- 
tions of men. And as I survey that lonely, ab- 
stracted, disappointed, and derided man — poor 
and unimportant, so harassed by debt that his 
creditors seized even his maps and charts, obliged 
to fly from one country to another to escape im- 
prisonment, without even listeners and still less 
friends, and yet with ever-increasing faith in his 
cause, utterly unconquerable, alone in opposition 
to all the world — I think I see the most persistent 
man of enterprise that I have read of in history. 
Critics ambitious to say something new may rake 
out slanders from the archives of enemies, and 
discover faults which derogate from the character 
we have been taught to admire and venerate; 
they may even point out spots which we cannot 
disprove in that sun of glorious brightness which 
shed its beneficent rays over a century of dark- 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 137 

ness, — but this we know, that, whatever may be 
the force of detraction, his fame has been steadily 
increasing, even on the admission of his slander- 
ers, for three centuries, and that he now shines as 
a fixed star in the constellation of the great lights 
of modern times, not alone because he succeeded 
in crossing the ocean when once embarked on it, 
but for surmounting the moral difficulties which 
lay in his way before he could embark upon it, 
and for being finally instrumental in conferring 
the greatest boon that our world has received 
from any mortal man since Noah entered into the 
ark." 

The following extract is from Mr. William C. 
Bryant's " History of the United States " : 

" With a patience that nothing could wear out, 
and a perseverance that was absolutely uncon- 
querable, Columbus waited and labored for eight- 
een years, appealing to minds that wanted light 
and to ears that wanted hearing. His ideas of 
the possibilities of navigation were before his 
time. It was one thing to creep along the coast 
of Africa, where the hold upon the land need 
never be lost ; another, to steer out boldly into 



138 ESTIMATES OF Hiu CHARACTER. 

that wilderness of waters over which mystery 
and darkness brooded. 

" The glory of the discovery he actually made 
has to a remarkable degree obscured the fact that 
in the long discussion before kings and councils 
of the discovery he proposed to make it was 
Columbus who was in the wrong, and his oppo- 
nents who were in the right, on the main question 
— a short western route to India. The ignorance, 
the obstinacy, the stupidity, with which he so 
long contended were, indeed, obstacles in the 
way of an event so important to all civilized 
races as the possession of half the globe; but 
that event was no more proposed or foreseen by 
Columbus than it was opposed by those who with- 
stood him the most persistently, or ridiculed him 
the most unmercifully. 

" But at last, as he believed, and as they were 
forced to confess, by an event which all misap- 
prehended, he was justified. The enthusiasm, the 
strength of faith, the tenacity of purpose, which 
through so many years had never faltered, had 
at length triumphed — triumphed even in the final 
struggle with the superstition and desperation of 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHAEACTEB. 139 

men who would have gladly sacrificed him to 
their fears." 

" His impetuous ardor threw him into the study 
of the fathers of the Church, the Arabian Jews, 
and the ancient geographers j while his daring 
but irregular genius, bursting from the limits of 
imperfect science, bore him to conclusions far 
beyond the intellectual vision of his contempo- 
raries. If some of his conclusions were erroneous, 
they were at least ingenious and splendid ; and 
their error resulted from the clouds which still 
hung over his peculiar path of enterprise. His 
own discoveries enlightened the ignorance of the 
age, guided conjecture to certainty, and dispelled 
the very darkness with which he had been obliged 
to struggle. In the progress of his discoveries 
he has been remarked for the extreme sagacity 
and the admirable justness with which he seized 
upon the phenomena of the exterior world. The 
variations, for instance, of terrestrial magnetism, 
the direction of currents, the groupings of ma- 
rine plants, fixing one of the grand climacteric 
divisions of the ocean, the temperatures changing 
not solely with the distance to the equator, but 



140 ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 

also with the difference of the meridians : these 
and similar phenomena as they broke npon him 
were discerned with wonderful quickness of per- 
ception, and made to contribute important prin- 
ciples to the stock of general knowledge. This 
lucidity of spirit, this quick convertibility of facts 
to principles, distinguish him from the dawn to 
the close of his sublime enterprise, insomuch that, 
with all the sallying ardor of his imagination, his 
ultimate success has been admirably character- 
ized as a l conquest of reflection.' He was de- 
cidedly a visionary, but a visionary of an uncom- 
mon and successful kind. The manner in which 
his ardent, imaginative, and mercurial nature was 
controlled by a powerful judgment, and directed 
by an acute sagacity, is the most extraordinary 
feature in his character. This governed his 
imagination, instead of exhausting itself in idle 
flights, lent aid to his judgment, and enabled him 
to form conclusions at which common minds 
could never have arrived, nay, which they could 
not perceive when pointed out. l His soul,' ob- 
serves a Spanish writer, * was superior to the age 
in which he lived. For him was reserved the 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 141 

great enterprise of traversing that sea which had 
given rise to so many fables, and of deciphering 
the mystery of his time.' With all the visionary 
fervor of his imagination, its fondest dreams fell 
short of the reality. He died in ignorance of the 
real grandeur of his discovery. Until his last 
breath he entertained the idea that he had merely 
opened a new way to the old resorts of opnlent 
commerce, and had discovered some of the wild 
regions of the East. He supposed Hispaniola to 
be the ancient Ophir which had been visited by 
the ships of Solomon, and that Cuba and Terra 
Firma were but remote parts of Asia. What 
visions of glory would have broken upon his 
mind could he have known that he had indeed 
discovered a new continent, equal to the whole of 
the Old World in magnitude, and separated by 
two vast oceans from all the earth hitherto known 
by civilized man ! And how would his magnani- 
mous spirit have been consoled, amidst the afflic- 
tions of age and the cares of penury, the neglect 
of a fickle public, and the injustice of an ungrate- 
ful king, could he have anticipated the splendid 
empires which were to spread over the beautiful 



142 ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 

world lie had discovered; and the nations and 
tongues and languages which were to fill its lands 
with his renown, and revere and bless his name 
to the latest posterity." * 

The last citation, and the latest in the order of 
time, is from the work of an " accepted authority " 
on the subject,! who remarks: "No one can 
deny that Las Casas was a keen judge of men, 
or that his standard of right and wrong was 
quite as lofty as any one has reached in our own 
time. He had a much more intimate knowledge 
of Columbus than any modern historian can ever 
hope to acquire, and he always speaks of him 
with warm admiration and respect. But how 
could Las Casas ever have respected the feeble, 
mean-spirited driveler whose portrait Mr. Winsor 
asks us to accept as that of the Discoverer of 
America! If, however, instead of his biograph- 
ical estimate of Columbus, we consider Mr. Win- 
sor's contributions toward a correct statement 
of the difficult geographical questions connected 
with the subject, we recognize at once the work 
of an acknowledged master in his chosen field. 

* Washington Irving. t John Fiske. 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 143 

It is work, too, of the first order of importance. 
It would be hard to mention a subject on which 
so many reams of direful nonsense have been 
written as on the discovery of America. In 
dealing with the subject one must steadily keep 
before one's mind the quaint notions of ancient 
geographers, especially Ptolemy and Mela, as por- 
trayed upon maps. It was just these distorted 
and hazy notions that swayed the minds and 
guided the movements of the great discoverers. 
Without constant reference to these old maps one 
cannot begin to understand the circumstances 
of the discovery. 

"In recent years elaborate researches have 
been made by Henry Harrisse and others in the 
archives of Genoa, Savona, Seville, and other 
places with which Columbus was connected, in 
the hope of supplementing this imperfect infor- 
mation concerning his earlier years. A number of 
data have thus been obtained, which, while clear- 
ing up the subject most remarkably in some 
directions, have been made to mystify and em- 
broil it in others. The general impression, how- 
ever, which the discussions of the past twenty 



144 ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 

years have left upon my mind is that the more 
violent hypotheses are not likely to be sustained, 
and that the newly ascertained facts do not call 
for any very radical interference with the tra- 
ditional lines upon which the life of Columbus 
has heretofore been written." 

By thus placing in close proximity these diver- 
gent and conflicting opinions of eminent writers, 
the reader will be the better enabled to collate 
them together and form his own conclusion. The 
high position that Columbus has for centuries oc- 
cupied in the world's annals has naturally tended 
in an unusual degree to challenge the closest 
scrutiny and criticism. Few critics, it may be 
added, are to be found in their judgment entirely 
free from prejudice or bias, on one side or the 
other. Without further adding to the above esti- 
mates and opinions — much less attempting to har- 
monize them — this eclectic summary may suffice. 

Until Columbus had solved the mystery of the 
dark sea, nothing of great importance had been 
discovered in nautical affairs that resulted in any 
practical value to the world. That event formed 
the great epoch of maritime history, as did the 



ESTIMATES OF HIS CHARACTER. 145 

landing of the Pilgrim Fathers, subsequently, in 
civil and ecclesiastical history. And both have 
alike exerted a controlling and beneficent influ- 
ence upon mankind in each hemisphere. Looking 
backward to the daring experiment of Columbus 
with his three small caravels, when the " ocean 
sea " was regarded with mysterious dread as one 
of horrors and disasters, we can better appre- 
ciate the grandeur of his enterprise. That sea 
of gloomy dread contrasted with the same broad 
ocean — now the great highway of the commerce 
of all nations, which bears upon its mighty bosom 
argosies of stately sea-palaces and the merchant- 
craft of every clime — may well justify the pride 
we feel in this our age when we contemplate its 
marvels of naval architecture and nautical skill, 
as well as its achievements in other departments 
of science and of art. 



WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 



i. 

SALAD FOR THE SOLITARY AND THE 
SOCIAL. 

By FREDERICK SAUNDERS. 

Popular edition, revised, and illustrated with over fifty engrav- 
ings. One volume, 8vo, 526 pages, handsomely bound. Cloth, 
gilt top, $2.00 ; full gilt edges, $2.50. 

" It is an inexhaustible magazine from whence to draw genial intellectual 
entertainment, and sharp provocatives to wholesome mirth and gayety." — 
Harper's Magazine. 

" It is emphatically a book to buy." — New- York Times. 

" A volume that may be read and re-read." — New-York World. 

"One of the most delightful series of essays in our language." — Albion. 

"It breathes the fine aroma of the library." — New-York Tribune. 

"A delightful companion for all seasons and for all occasions." — Boston 
Traveller. 

" There is hardly another book that contains so much good and quotable 
matter of its kind." — New- York Evening- Post. 

" It is full of incident, witticism, wise maxim, and felicitous illustration. 
The new popular edition just published is very attractive to the eye, and will, 
doubtless, create a new constituency for itself." — The Christian Union. 

*** Copies for sale at all first-class bookstores, or will be forwarded free, 
on receipt of price, by the publisher, 

THOMAS WHITTAKER, 

2 and 3 Bible House, New-York. 



BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 

II. 
PASTIME PAPERS. 

One volume, i2mo, cloth extra, $1.00 ; paper covers, 50 cents. 

"De Quincey divided literature into the literature of knowledge and the 
literature of power. Mr. Saunders of the Astor Library distinguishes a third 
category in the literature of rest and recreation, with a refreshing quality in it, 
which, though it may not make it a literature of power, does not fail to soothe 
the fevered mind, and 

' Ease the anguish of a torturing hour. ' 

In his ' Salad for the Solitary and the Social,' he produced the first proof of 
his ability in such recreative essays. After several years of silence he has 
again set his hand to the same work, and given us an attractive i6mo, pub- 
lished by Whittaker, under the similar title of Pastime Papers.' 
The papers are rich in the good quality of rare and curious learning, gleaned 
from long acquaintance with a great library." — New-York Independent. 

" ' Pastime Papers' are a series of light essays dealing with various sub- 
jects. Mr. Saunders has profitably and agreeably condensed here much varied 
reading with admirable results. These gracefully written papers may well be- 
guile any person pleasantly of a leisure hour." — London Graphic. 

" ' Pastime Papers ' show the results of many excursions into out-of-the-way 
nooks of literature. Quaint stories, odd facts, curious observations, have been 
woven by the judicious author into a series of graceful papers full of pleasant 
reflection and gentle humor." — New-York Tribune. 

" They are graceful and attractive, but they are something more. They 
convey a good deal of information ; and they stimulate while they refresh, and 
furnish no small amount of material for profitable thought. Few readers, es- 
pecially such as are of a literary turn, will fail to find their account in turning 
the leaves of this dainty volume. " — Christian Intelligencer. 

" They show how industriously this literary bee has fed upon the flowery lit- 
erature of the Astor Library, and what a wise use he has made of the mental 
honey thus gathered." — New- York Telegraph. 

V Copies for sale at all first-class bookstores, or will be forwarded free, 
on receipt of price, by the publisher, 

THOMAS WHITTAKER, 

2 and 3 Bible House, New-York. 



BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 
III. 

STRAY LEAVES OF LITERATURE. 

One volume, i2mo, cloth extra, $1.25. 

"As the writer says ' Good night ' to us at the close of this series of essays, 
we wish that he could stay and talk a little longer. He is so cheerful, so full 
of literary reminiscences, so bright and chatty, as to make us regret that he 
leaves us so soon to our own rather commonplace reflections, as we fix our 
fires, and prepare for ' tired nature's sweet restorer.' Such a book is pervaded 
with the aroma of a good library. It was evidently written among books, and 
no lover of books will fail to notice the nice sympathy and appreciations which 
the writer has managed to express on almost every page. Mr. Saunders of 
the Astor Library, in New-York, of which he was appointed librarian in 1876, 
is pretty well known to most literary readers. Anything that he writes is sure 
of a welcome. In his previous volumes he has shown a most felicitous way of 
chatting about books, men, and things ; and this present book adds to his 
reputation. So bright and attractive is he that the general reader, hitherto un- 
acquainted with this fellow-worker with Bryant on the Evening Post, this 
London-born veteran of eighty-two years, would be likely to take him for one 
still in the hope and flush of life's forenoon. These ' Stray Leaves ' comprise 
thirteen essays on various subjects, the first of which, that on ' Old Book 
Notes,' contains many quaint and curious bits of information, and is perhaps 
the best. 

" It speaks and also reminds one somewhat of the ' Curiosities of Literature ' 
published by the elder Disraeli very near a century ago. It is to be noticed how 
he lingers over the old books, the tried and enduring ones, suggesting that our 
present literary tastes are, if anything, a little too current. ' Readers of new 
books only,' he says, ' like those who indulge too freely in new bread, may 
suffer from dyspepsia, mentally and physically.' He stimulates to the best 
kind of reading. He is full of references and quotations. While his book con- 
tains little that is strictly new, much curious and half-forgotten lore is here 
brought to light. Diamonds of literary and esthetic beauty are brought into 
close contrast with a few rough potatoes of common sense, to borrow the figure 
of an old poem, and it is hard to tell which should be preferred. It is a happy 
idea, where in his essay on ' Head, Heart, and Hand ' he states that it is ' es- 
sential to a man's happiness that he maintain pacific relations both with his 
conscience and his stomach.' In his view of things he fully agrees with Lamb, 
who held that 'a laugh is worth a hundred groans in any state of the market.' 

" The old songs and ballads of different races are touched upon pleasandy, 
and light is shed over some of them. Sympathy and the seasons, music, sal- 
utations, and flowers, with several other themes, are treated in his delightful 
conversational way. A clear and concise index renders the facts and anec- 
dotes of the volume readily available. These essays are so gracefully written, 
so rich in the rare and curious gleanings of his library reading, that many a 
leisure hour may be profitably charmed away. The latch-string is always out 
for Mr. Saunders. We hope that he will ' call again.' " —Public Opinion. 

*** Copies for sale at all book-sellers, or will be forwarded free, on 
receipt of price, by the publisher, 

THOMAS WHITTAKER, 

a and 3 Bible House, New- York. 



. w 



^ • " <v 



V* .«i^* <% 



.0* .'-•»- *> 



v v 













k 



£ °- «♦*.•&&% £*£fe?°* /-^*- 






-. **0« 



*°< 



*o 



i* ♦ « • •- 









^* v • 









** v^R** «* ^ -^WV * v -* ''MPS** & %> 





















.' > V ^ ' 



5 V^-V VW>* V Tftr v* % 

«Sr. % / 4|fe %./ *iSfe ■ %/ -^Sfe 



^ ^VA * * /: 












.•i ^ .- 






^* .y ^••T2^- A ol> %. *^ 



■ 






STORY OF THE DISCOVER 





i: STORY OF THE DISCOV 
OFTHENEWWOR1 
BY C0LUM5US 



